Live Like We're Bulletproof
by LittleGee
Summary: "I'm not supposed to be here." A recurring line in all ASBO-laden young offenders, Blake would be the first to admit. Okay, she'd been an accomplice in a public misdemeanour, but was being guilty by association a good enough reason to be assigned 200 hours of community service? She didn't think so. But leave it to her boneheaded Irish best mate to land her in this situation anyway.
1. Down Since Day One

**A/N - Oh it****'s true, it's damn true. I am back with a totally revamped Misfits fic. And by revamped I mean, "absolutely nothing like my original story but I really miss writing about Misfits and I still get so many messages about **_**The Art of Abnormality**_** that I'm trying my hand at a new story." I feel like my writing has improved significantly since I wrote TAoA. I mean, I was 16 when I wrote it, for Christ's sake. I was in the middle of my GCSEs, I didn't know next to anything about life as an adult. Okay, I still don't even at 22, but…let me live a little. I'm biting the bullet and writing this because I love the Misfits universe and feel ready to dive back in headfirst. So without further ado, welcome to **_**Live Like We're Bulletproof**_**…**

* * *

**Chapter One - Down Since Day One**

_**Oi, shithead. You better be awake or you can find your own way to the community centre.  
**__Sent 07:23_

**It hurts that you doubt me in such a way. Of course I'm awake.  
**_Sent 07:26_

_**Well after the amount of J**__**ä**__**gers you downed last night while we attempted to drown our sorrows, I figured I had to check.  
**__Sent 07:29_

**You say downed, I say sipped like an educated gentleman.  
**_Sent 07:31_

_**No, what I say is "you're a bellend" and be ready in 5 mins cuz if you're not ready when I get to yours, you are def walking.  
**__Sent 07:35_

* * *

I wasn't supposed to be here. And I know a lot of people in my situation say that, but seriously, _I was not supposed to be here_. My sentencing to 200 hours of community service was a very convoluted example of "wrong place, wrong time." I didn't start it, it wasn't my fault and if this was America, I would sue. No, the reason I was stood here outside the Wertham Community Centre in a baggy, hideously bright orange Community Payback jumpsuit was because of my moronic best friend of 17 years.

"I cannot _believe_ you managed to get us into this situation," I muttered, leaning back against the metal railings with my arms crossed, eyes hidden behind sunglasses despite the fact it was a typical overcast South London morning, much chillier than June should have been.

"C'mon Blake, you know you're just as to blame for this as I am," Nathan whined, nudging me in the ribs with his bony elbow.

"Am I the one who A) stole pic n' mix, B) stapled a bowling alley manager or C) tried to crawl into the pinsetter? No," I retorted. "I'm the one who tried to pull you _out_ of the pinsetter and nearly cracked my face open when you kicked me over!"

"No, you're not, but you _are_ the one who started a screaming match with your psycho ex then threw a bowling bowl at him. After I'd just had a seizure, no less!" Nathan shot back smugly.

Okay so maybe "it wasn't my fault" was a bit of a stretch when it came to my community service. But in my defense, my ex-boyfriend Julian was all kinds of nasty. The kinds of nasty I don't even want to get into right now.

"After you'd faked a seizure, you mean," I snorted.

"Potato, potarto," he said with a sniff, shoving his hands in his pockets. It was just then that the front doors of the community centre opened and the other five ASBO-awarded youths we would be spending these delightful 200 hours with graced us with their presence. I was very grateful that this meant Nathan and I had to end this portion of our trip down Memory Lane, as most conversations that involved talking about Julian ended with me in tears. Even now, I still nervously scratched at the scar along my left wrist that I had covered with a tattoo of a bird on a branch.

No one in the group that had joined us in the lineup against the railings said a single word. Well, not a single to word to me or Nathan, anyway. One of the two females - a stunning mixed race girl with masses of natural, curly brown hair - was chatting away on her mobile and cackling like she was the only one here. In the space of thirty seconds I'd already learned that someone called Chloe had let someone called Jake do her up the arse because he bought her a KFC. Classic case of TMI.

The other girl…well, how do I describe her. I really didn't like using the word chav but there really was no other way to explain her. Long mousy hair scraped back into a ponytail so tight it looked like she'd tried to scalp herself, lethal-looking silver hoops dangling from her ears, smudgy cheap eye makeup smeared on her eyelids and a face like a bulldog chewing on a wasp.

Suffice to say, I was a bit scared to go near her and immediately swapped sides with Nathan to stand next to a bloke who looked like he'd just stepped out of a recording session with a bad ripoff of NWA. He had a spotless baseball cap plonked on his head at an angle, teeth that made guests on _Jeremy Kyle_ look like the epitome of Hollywood dentistry, some Poundland bling and scuffed Adidas trainers. I wouldn't have been surprised if a switchblade was in his pocket. Hm, maybe I would have been better standing next to the girl who looked like she'd punch my lights out just for asking how she was doing.

Standing next to Not-So-Slim Shady was Wertham's very own disgraced sports star, track runner Curtis Donovan. He'd been pegged to be a huge hit at the London 2012 Olympics, but he'd absolutely fucked his career when he got busted at a rave with some drugs. There were several rumours floating around at the time that he was caught with crack, with steroids, with ket…hell, I even heard one that it was an illegal high-powered Viagra. Whatever it was, he'd been banned from athletic competition for two years. No wonder he was wearing an expression like someone had shat in his hands and forced him to clap.

The final member of this cheerful entourage was a pale, twitchy-looking guy who looked like the only crime he could ever commit was not turning in his Physics homework on time. He kept fiddling with his mobile like he thought someone was gonna nick it straight out of his hand, and he also kept nervously avoiding eye contact with anything or anyone. My God, this was some stellar company for the next 12 weeks of shifts. Literally, kill me now.

Finally, after freezing our arses off for five minutes, our big hulking probation worker decided to join us. "About fucking time," I mumbled to Nathan, who made no effort to hide the loud snort he let out. The probation worker glared at us, then went on to introduce himself as Tony and launched into a speech about why we were all here, how this shitshow would rehabilitate our criminal ways and teach us how to be upstanding members of the community.

I was getting so bored, I found myself wondering if slitting my wrist for a second time would actually kill me this time.

"This is it. This is your chance to do something positive," Tony informed us. "Give something back. You can help people, you can really make a _difference_ to people's lives. That's what community service is all about. There are people out there who think you're scum." I blinked a few times in disbelief; harsh, much. "You have an opportunity to show them they're wrong."

"Yeah but what if they're right?" Nathan piped up, and I openly facepalmed.

"_What are you doing_?!" I hissed, but he ignored me and carried on.

He turned to the guy the other side of me - the gangster guy - patted him on the shoulder and said, "No offense, but I'm thinking some people are just born criminals."

"You lookin' to get stabbed?" the 'gangsta' snarled.

"You see my point there?!" Nathan said defensively, gesturing at him for a few seconds before I forcefully wrenched his arm down.

It was then that a generic phone tone blared out of Curly Girl's mobile, and she answered with a nonchalant, "Hey."

"Doesn't matter what you've done in the past," Tony tried to keep going with his speech, but Curls' incessant chatter cut over him.

"Doing my community service."

"Hey!" he attempted to interrupt her, but she blanked him entirely.

"Boring as fuck."

"Excuse me!" he said louder. "Hello, I'm still talking!"

"What, I thought you'd finished!" she snapped back, taking the phone away from her ear finally.

"Yeah, because the way his lips were moving and noise was coming out really made it look like he'd finished talking," I said derisively, rolling my eyes; I couldn't stand girls like her.

"Yeah, but Blakey, he could have been yawning…or chewing…" Nathan chipped in mock-pensively, causing me to blow out a massive sigh of defeat. When Nathan got into one of his twattish moods, it was easier for me to let him just get on with it. At least Curls thought it was funny as she let out a shrill giggle.

"End the call! Hang up!" Tony shouted at her, but still she kept on blabbering away.

"My probation worker." In the meantime, Nathan had decided to christen the pale guy at the end of the line with the charming moniker of Weird Kid before blowing a kiss at Mr Stabby, who then threatened to rip out Nathan's throat and shit down his neck, and Donovan had announced that, "I shouldn't be here, man."

_Yeah, join the queue, buddy_, I irately thought. Ten minutes in and I already felt like I was trapped in a bloody lunatic asylum, and growing up with Nathan made that sort of feeling quite a feat.

"We need to work as a team here." How Tony found the will to keep going, I had no idea. I actually felt quite sorry for the poor guy. He was just trying to do his job and now he had to try to keep some form of order around us seven delinquents. Good fucking luck to him. "Hey, that's enough!" Nathan and Mr Stabby had now started some kind of childish sparring fight resulting in Mr Stabby shoving past me and getting his hands fisted in the collar of Nathan's jumpsuit.

"Nathan, will you fucking knock it off!" I reprimanded him, moving to pull him away from Mr Stabby before he got shanked in the gut or something.

"Can I move to a different group?" Curtis asked over the hubbub. "This isn't gonna work for me."

"Ooh, look at the poor wittle athwete, all sad and angwy cause he wost his Owympics pass," I said in a sarcastic baby voice. "Get over yourself, man."

"Bitch," he sniffed contemptuously.

"What makes ya think that ya better than us?" Little Miss Chav demanded. Dear God, with an accent like that, I suddenly had no qualms with branding her a chav before I even got to know her.

"What is that accent?!" Nathan spluttered, our thoughts the same.

"Is that for real?" Curtis snorted.

What came out of her mouth next just sounded like a garbled mess, but I was pretty sure it was something along the lines of, "If you're trying to say something, then yeah!"

"It's- are you-" Nathan mocked, holding his ear. "That's just a noise, are we supposed to be able to understand her?"

"Yeah, can we hire like, a fucking translator for her or something?" I requested, raising my hand then swiftly lowering it when she glowered at me so violently I think my hair caught fire.

"Do ya understand that?" she spat out, flipping Nathan and I off with an outgrown acrylic.

"I think she likes me," Nathan sniggered, flinging an arm around Mr Stabby who responded by grabbing hold of Nathan by the neck again and trying to strangle him. I didn't even bother to try to help this time around since Nathan had _definitely _brought this on himself, and besides, Tony had managed to pry them apart…even if Mr Stabby continually lunged for Nathan who was making kung-fu gestures at him while the rest of us absolutely pissed ourselves laughing.

Okay, so maybe the next 200 hours weren't going to be as bad as I initially thought.

* * *

I was wrong. Holy fuck, I was wrong.

"Nathan, you need to take me back to the doctor or something because I literally feel like I'm ready to kill myself again," I moaned, sploshing paint down onto the seat of the bench we were both painting a lovely crisp white colour. There were only six of us out here at the moment. After just half an hour of painting, Mr Stabby had managed to cover the brim of his shitty cap in paint, thrown a massive bitch-fit about it then stalked off into the community centre to clean himself up, but not before he'd kicked over a paint can and plastered the pavement in Pure Brilliant White. That was twenty minutes ago, and he'd just never bothered to return. What. A. Shame.

"You're so fucking dramatic," Nathan retorted, dipping his own paintbrush into our shared can of paint. He then let out a low laugh. "Hey Blake, this give ya any flashbacks?" I had no time to react as he flicked the loaded paintbrush at me, splattering my jumpsuit with white.

I burst into a fit of giggles. "As much of a flashback as this'll give you!" I cupped my hands and scooped some water from my paint wash tub into them, which I quickly flung at Nathan's face, splashing him head-on and making him splutter.

This had pretty much been an exact reenactment of the day Nathan and I met, waaaay back when we were just five-year-old teeny-boppers.

Seventeen years ago, Nathan and his family moved to England from Ireland, into a house just two streets away from me and my family. This meant Nathan joined my primary school, Wertham Park Primary. When our teacher Miss Wilson introduced him to the class, I was the first person to say hello to him, but he called me a bumface then went to stand at a plastic easel in the painting area.

Undeterred, I followed him, determined to make him feel welcome even if he didn't want me to. I stood at the easel next to him and the two of us were painting in an uncomfortable silence until there was a sudden _splat_ noise. I looked down, and saw that my favourite school pinafore dress was dripping in red paint and Nathan was in a fit of laughter holding an open red paint pot.

Letting out an angry scream, I threw my pot of dirty paint water at him which soaked him from head to toe, and the two of us ended up in an absolutely pathetic slapsie fight which resulted in Miss Wilson hauling our arses to the headteacher's - Mr Joseph's - office. Mr Joseph let loose on us, a little scary when you're five but funny enough when we could see his toupé threatening to fall off every time he shook his head. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Nathan's shoulders shaking with suppressed laughter, and when he caught my eye, I began to laugh too.

Mr Joseph noticed this and began to get even angrier, shouting more, shaking his head more and making that toupé wobble even more which of course made us laugh even harder. The next day, Nathan said hi to me in the cloakroom and I asked him if he wanted to sit with me at lunch. He said yes, and we've been inseparable ever since.

Does he do my head in? Yes. Does he wind me up in ways I can't possibly begin to explain? Yep indeedy. Do I think he's a twat? Of course. Could I be without him? Absolutely fucking not.

Nathan was my best mate, we'd been there for each other through everything, through thick and thin, as clichéd as it sounds. When Nathan's dad left his mum, my parents let him stay with us for a few weeks to get his head straight. When Julian punched me so hard in the face he broke my jaw seven months ago, Nathan was the one who got me to the hospital and called the cops on that abusive dickhead. We had other friends, of course we did, but we were each other's number one and always would be.

Ew. Now that vomit-fest of a backstory is over with, let's get back to the present.

"Do you even realise how much Vanish this is gonna take to get out?!" I complained, futilely trying to wipe the paint away to no avail. "I didn't want to do a colours wash until Thursday!"

"Don't be a baby, you know me Mum will wash it if you want her too," Nathan said dismissively. I just rolled my eyes and decided not to dignify that with an answer. Poor old Louise had cleaned up enough of our messes as kids and teenagers, she didn't need to be washing my clothes when I was a vaguely independent 22-year-old woman.

Nathan managed to be quiet for approximately two minutes before he decided it was time to grace the world with the sound of his voice again. Before I could stop him, he'd stood up and turned to face the chav girl and asked her, "So I'm guessing…shoplifting? No?"

"Don't act like ya know me cuz ya don't," she mumbled, scowling at him.

"I'm just making conversation," he said innocently. "This is a chance to network with other young offenders, we should be swapping tips! Brainstorming! Come on, what did you do?"

"A girl called me a slag so I just got into a fight," the chav admitted.

"Was this on _The Jeremy Kyle Show_?" Nathan questioned in the fakest sympathetic tone I'd heard in my life.

"No it was down Argos!" she retorted irately. Defending herself by getting into a fight in a public place, now that was something I could relate to. Maybe me and this girl could be good friends…if she stopped looking so goddamn fierce all the time.

"Ah, Argos." Nathan nodded sagely. "You know what you shoulda done? You should have got one of them little pens they have and jabbed it in her eye!" The chav just gawped at him.

"I apologise for him and his lack of…well, lack of anything remotely polite, really," I interjected quickly. "He fell off a jungle gym and smashed his head open when we were little…he's never been right in the brain since."

"Do yous two know each other?" she asked, sparking the first friendly conversation anyone in this group had had all morning.

"Unfortunately, yes. Best friends since we were five," I said with yet another roll of my eyes. "Blake Harper." I pointed at myself. "Nathan Young." I gestured vaguely to the Irish one.

"Kelly Bailey," she said with a nod of her head. Oh good, at least I could stop referring to her as 'the chav' now.

"Hey, what about you, Weird Kid?" Nathan suddenly called over to Pale-and-Twitchy, who was painting the bench next to us solo. "Don't take this the wrong way or anything, but you look like a panty sniffer. Ya know?" He mimed sniffing a very large - too large - pair of knickers. It kind of reminded me of that one episode of _SpongeBob _where Mr Krabs raids his mum's knicker drawer.

"I'm not a panty-sniffer," Pale-and-Twitchy said quietly. "I'm not a pervert!"

"Don't you dare- NATHAN!" I barked as Nathan suddenly positioned his paintbrush over his crotch and began to wank it off, making some very disturbing groans and moans.

"I tried to burn someone's house down!" Pale-and-Twitchy exploded, and the confession surprised Nathan so much that he immediately ceased his wanking and made a noise akin to the sound a bicycle's breaks made when you pulled them too tight.

I would have made a point of saying sorry to the poor kid but a clap of thunder took my attention away from him and to the skies instead. Dark grey clouds were beginning to roll over the lake and community centre, very ominous-looking. I frowned; it was early June, the weather was not supposed to be like this.

"What did you do?" Kelly asked Nathan.

"Me?" he said innocuously. "I was done for eating some pic n' mix."

"Bullshit!" I mock-coughed, covering my mouth just enough to let the word escape.

"Bullshit? Then what he really do?" Kelly directed at me, but I shook my head.

"Sorry, but that so ain't my story to tell. If he wants to say he got done for eating pic n' mix then so be it, just know he's robbing you of one hell of a tale." I shrugged.

"What about you?" Apparently Kelly was a bit of a Chatty Cathy. She was certainly relentless in her pursuit of information.

"Um…well, let's just say I don't have a very good relationship with my ex and things got outta hand in a very public way," I muttered, embarrassed. Thankfully I was saved from further explanation as yet another rumble of thunder echoed around the community area and those clouds rolled in even closer.

"_What _is going on with this weather?" Nathan said rhetorically as all six of us turned our heads up to the sky. Cue Tony the Probation Worker to appear out of nowhere just as it looks like all of us had been doing fuck all for the last two hours.

"How did that happen?" he demanded, pointing at the mess made by the can of paint Mr Stabby had kicked over in his tantrum about his cap. "I mean, you've been here five minutes." Slight under-exaggeration but okay. "It's painting benches. _How_ do you screw that up?" None of us spoke. "You tell me because I've got no idea."

None of us ended up giving him an explanation because it was at that exact point that a huge - and I mean _huge -_ fucking great hailstone fell from the sky and crushed a nearby car, utterly obliterating its roof and caving in all the windows. Everyone screamed and ducked, and I ended up leaping into Nathan's arms _Scooby Doo_-style. Thankfully he caught me or I'd have been looking at one broken tailbone.

By the time we all recovered from the shock, no one dared speak. We all just stared at the crushed car with our mouths agape, unsure what to do next. All I could register was the sound of the car's alarm blaring. Tony ended up being the first to find his voice. "That's my car!" he gasped.

"Haha, classic!" Nathan chuckled, but he wasn't laughing when another one of those hailstones came flying from the clouds and smashed into the ground beside us, narrowly missing Kelly. Ice exploded everywhere and showered down on us. "Okay, so I'm a little bit freaked out!"

"What is that?!" squeaked Alisha, and we all followed her gaze. The sky had been overtaken by a pitch black cloud that almost resembled a floating oil slick. Pale-and-Twitchy had flipped his mobile open and for whatever stupid reason was recording everything happening. Y'know, because that was a fucking priority at this moment in time.

Then out of nowhere smaller versions of that hailstone began to careen down from the sky. When I say 'small' I mean 'smaller than the beast that crushed Tony's car' because these fuckers were the size of fucking rounders balls. One of them crashed into a dumpster near the weird kid and knocked it clean over; the weird kid was centimetres away from having his head knocked off by the ice shards.

"Right, let's get everyone inside," Tony hastily instructed, gesturing at the community centre with his arms. "LET'S MOVE!" We didn't need to be told twice. I'd never been more grateful to be wearing my trusty sturdy Doc Martens as we sprinted towards the doors as quickly as we could, darting and dodging as we tried to avoid getting knocked out by the hailstones which were literally cracking the paving stones. I had never seen anything like this in my life, not in reality, in a horror movie, in a comic book. Nothing. What was happening? _What was happening?!_

This was one of those rare moments where Nathan showed consideration for someone other than himself. His hand was tightly gripping mine as he practically dragged me through the storm. To be honest, I wasn't gonna complain about the extra help as my tiny-arse 5"5 frame wasn't gonna be carrying me anywhere in a hurry.

Eventually we made it to the heavy metal front door of the community centre…only to discover that they were locked. Oh my fucking God, we needed _that _like a hole in the goddamn head. "Is this a fucking joke?!" I screeched as Tony began fiddling with his selection of keys, trying to find the one that fit.

"Don't be so rude!" he reprimanded in a snarl, still wrestling with the keys. We were cowered under the canopy by the doors, ice still flinging at us every time a hailstone collided with the ground. Everyone was screaming at Tony to hurry the fuck up as he took his sweet-ass time to find the correct key. My heart was thumping like a jackhammer as I tried to inch my way closer and close to the door, hoping that I'd be able to shove my way in before anyone else once they were finally open.

"Come on!" Nathan yelled. "Open the door!"

"Hurry the fuck up!" I howled.

"Open the fucking door!" the girl with the curly hair screamed.

"Don't speak to me like that!" Tony turned around and yelled at us. It was a bloody ridiculous time for him to be worried about manners, in my opinion. But then suddenly…we were flying. We sailed through the air like the seven of us had been set off from a fucking catapult, as if in slow motion. Of course, things seemed to speed up when we landed in a heap on the ground, me landing on Nathan and breaking my fall, but I still managed to crack the back of my head on the pavement.

Lightning. I had just been struck by fucking lightning. Holy Jesus, how had I not died?! Instead, I just felt really strange…like, something was off, not in a 'I'm gonna be sick' way, but more of a 'has my soul just removed itself from my body?' kinda off. My head felt completely fried, and I definitely had a bump forming where I'd smashed it against the concrete. Shit, electrocution hurt.

Car alarms were screaming in the distance. A few more of those giant hailstones fell from the sky, and then…nothing. The storm ended just as abruptly as it had began. We all lie there for a few seconds, trying to wrap our heads around what in the name of bald Jesus had just happened, then attempted to struggle into some form of sitting position.

"I feel really weird," mumbled Kelly.

"Welcome the club on that one, hun," I moaned, scrubbing a hand down my face, past caring if it smudged my Taylor Momsen-inspired eyeliner.

"That'll be the lightning," groaned Curtis.

Nathan turned to face me. "You okay?"

"If by okay you mean severely freaked out, then yeah, I am fuckin' A," I replied quietly, still trying to comprehend how any of us had survived that. Not that I wasn't grateful, mind.

"We should be dead," Pale-and-Twitchy said worriedly, echoing my exact thoughts.

"The important thing right now is that we're not," I said to him, making a show of cracking my back as I ended up being the first person to attempt to stand up.

"A little reassurance might be nice, you know," Nathan mordantly directed at Tony. "'You're fine.' 'Looking good.'"

"Wanker!" Tony spat out, the right side of his face drooped like he'd had a minor stroke.

Nathan looked appalled. "Did he just call me a wanker?!"

"It's what we're all thinking," I said sweetly, taking Nathan's outstretched hand and helping to haul him to his feet.

"Is everyone alright?" Tony finally asked, less droopy-looking and sounding a tad more concerned than thirty seconds ago.

"We could have died, you dick," Curls bit out.

"_What_ is with you guys saying that?!" I exclaimed. "It's like you want us to be dead!"

"Are _you_ alright?" Kelly asked him, and his response to twitch in a totally-not-creepy manner. "You're acting like a freak." Understatement of the century, but alright.

"Maybe we should call it a day," he suggested.

"Mmm, maybe we should," I said with a sarcastic smile, then immediately regretted it; now we'd have to add another day to this shitshow just to make up the hours we were gonna lose. _Goddamn it, Harper, foot in mouth syndrome, much?! _However, no one else had any arguments about getting three-quarters of the day off, so we were sent back into the locker room to get changed.

* * *

Naturally the boys took about 30 seconds to change out of their jumpsuits back into their day clothes, but me, Kelly and Curls - whose name I had finally learned was Alisha - took slightly longer to get ready. I'd stuffed my stained jumpsuit into my backpack to take home with me. Not only did I want to wash it, but seeing how Alisha had made hers slightly less hideous by pinning up the ankles and wrists of the jumpsuit and wrapping a waist-belt around it had given me some inspiration I needed my sewing machine for.

After I'd wriggled back into my scuffed grey skinny jeans and black tank, laced myself back into my DMs and rearranged my collection of band wristbands, I looked into the small mirror I'd put into my locker - Locker 23 - and began to brush through my long brown hair. Kelly was in the main mirror tidying up her ponytail while Alisha stood by her locker texting.

Then out of nowhere, it all began to kick off.

Kelly suddenly rounded on Alisha and demanded, "What ya say?"

"I didn't _say _anything," Alisha said indignantly, but the way she emphasised 'say' made me think that she'd definitely had a few opinions floating through her thoughts. Kelly stared at her in distaste for a few seconds, then moved back to the mirror to carry on sorting out her hair. It was silent for a few beats, then Kelly whirled back on Alisha and spat, "_What_?!"

"What?!" Alisha shot back, but she look scared.

"WHAT?!" Kelly shouted, proper getting up in Alisha's face, who promptly vacated the locker room and leaving me alone with an extremely pissed off chav. Dear God, this girl could be terrifying when she wanted to be.

It was then that I abruptly became the one at the forefront of her anger. "What, you got something to say and all?!"

"Nope! Sure don't!" I said hurriedly, slamming my locker shut, grabbing my backpack and belting it from the room like my arse had been set on fire. I literally had noped my way outta that situation.

Thankfully, the boys were waiting just outside, which made me very surprised none of them had heard Mortal Kombat starting up in the next room. Instead, Curtis was just questioning, "Do we just go, then? Where's the probation worker?"

"Probably gone to report what just happened. You know, since we're getting a half day and all," I replied, standing next to Nathan who was by the drinks vending machine. "Can't wait to have to make up these hours."

"I think there's something wrong with him," Pale-and-Twitchy - no wait, pretty sure I'd heard him tell Curtis his name was Simon - pointed out, looking at something on his phone. "It's like he was having a spasm."

"Nah, that was definitely more of a stroke than a spasm," I laughed, remembering how stupid Tony had looked with half his face collapsed. "Spasms don't make you look like a basset hound."

"He was probably faking it anyway," Nathan dismissed. "Trying to get some compensation. Cheap bastard."

"I don't think he was faking it," Simon argued in the least convincing tone I had ever heard.

"And you'd know all about being…mental," Nathan said lowly, advancing on him creepily before suddenly twitching. "W-w-wanker!"

"You complete knobhead," I said scornfully, moving to slap him upside the head. "Ignore him, Simon, I usually do."

"Are we waiting for something?" Alisha appeared from nowhere, wearing that same bored expression she had been all day.

"Probation worker," Curtis answered, and she rolled her eyes.

"I ain't waiting around for that dickhead." And with that eloquent sentence, she turned on her heel and marched from the building.

I shrugged. "When in Rome," and ended up following her, Curtis and Simon from the building, Nathan straight behind me.

"Fancy coming round for dinner?" he asked once we were outside, the skies now a light grey colour as opposed to that black from earlier. The ground was completely dry too, the only sign the storm had happened being the cracks and small craters in the pavements.

"Depends," I said as we began to walk in the direction of my parked car, a pale blue 2005 VW Polo. "What's Louise cooking up?"

"Fuck knows, but I did see a lovely joint of lamb in the fridge this morning, no doubt there to celebrate my first day in rehabilitating myself," he smirked.

"Ooh lamb. Well, it sure beats the microwaved lasagne I was gonna have. I'm in," I grinned, unlocking the car.

"SHOTGUN!" Nathan suddenly yelled, barrel-rolling in what I assume he thought was a James Bond style over the bonnet. Would have worked too, if he hadn't fallen on his arse the other side. I burst out laughing, doubled over as he let out a string of curses from the tarmac.

Sure, Nathan was an absolute prick, but he was my prick. These 200 hours definitely wouldn't be so bad with my best mate by my side. Hell, they might even end up being fun.

* * *

**And that's chapter one! Gimme some loving guys, the response I had on my original fic was awesome, so I would love to get that again, maybe even more! Review, favourite, follow, anything to let me know what you think! Blake is one of my favourite characters I've ever created so I'd definitely love your opinions on her! Until next time, cheerio! Xx Gee xX**

**Blake Harper faceclaim: Kaya Scodelario**

**PS - A playlist will be going up on my YouTube, along with a trailer for the story itself. I'm a very visual writer, so I also have a collection on my Fashmates page (GigiAnne13) so check all of them out!**

**Chapter One Playlist  
**_**So Am I**_** \- Ava Max  
**_**Fucked Up World **_**\- The Pretty Reckless  
**_**Fucked Up Kids **_**\- Hit The Lights**


	2. That Ain't Banksy

**A/N- ****Thank you very much to Ronnie. H for being my first reviewer!**

* * *

**Chapter Two - That Ain't Banksy**

"Jesus Christ, will you turn this shit off," Nathan complained over the top of Bring Me The Horizon's _Suicide Season_ that I'd been playing on both the car ride to and now the ride from the community centre. "You're the who's all grungy and depressing and shit, don't be out here projecting that shit onto me and my beautiful face."

"Oh yeah, because The Prodigy really is the height of sophisticated music," I said sardonically, turning into Nathan's street. "Screaming 'smack my bitch up' is far superior to the profound lyrics 'the day you lost him, I slowly lost you too, for when he died he took a part of you.' Colour me corrected."

"I love it when you tell me I'm right," he said smugly, crossing his arms behind his head and closing his eyes.

"You know what, I'm not even gonna argue with you," I said wearily. "Today has been enough of a headfuck as it is without you giving me a headache and all." As I drove, I was desperately trying to ignore the dull, aching pain that had been running through my chest since the lightning. Oh fuck me, what if I was having a minor stroke? That was all I needed.

"Yeah man, the fuck was up with that storm?" Nathan agreed. "I know I'm electrifying and all that but getting struck by lightning was a bit to literal for my liking."

"Something ain't right about all this," I muttered, pulling up against the curb by Nathan's house. I hated saying it again, but we really should be dead. It was rare for anyone to survive getting struck directly by lightning, but somehow all seven of us had. It didn't make sense. Urgh, I couldn't cope with this. The second I stepped out of the car I reached into my backpack and grabbed a much-needed fag and my lighter, lighting up in seconds and taking a long drag. Ah, that sweet, sweet nicotine. Nathan had followed suit as he took his key out of his pocket and went to unlock his front door. The only thing was…the key didn't fit in the lock.

"Fuckin' brilliant, just what I need. The key's fucked," he griped, jiggling it a few times to see if that did anything.

"Don't worry, I've still got your emergency spare," I said, fiddling with my keychain that contained my car keys, flat key, family home key and Nathan's house spare that I had due to the numerous amount of times we'd been on nights out and he'd forgotten his key and wound up locked out. But as I went to stick it in the lock, it did the same as Nathan's had; I couldn't turn it and it barely fit into the lock as well. "Okay, what is going on?"

Nathan rapped on the window of the door. "Mum, it's me. My key won't work and neither will Blake's!" Silence, which was weird since Louise's car was parked in the drive - next to a load of what looked like bin bags filled with stuff for charity - so she was definitely home. "Are you gonna let us in?" Still nothing.

My patience was wearing thin after the day we'd had and I now knocked on the door myself. "Louise, can you hear us?"

"Blake, sweetie, please don't take this personally but this has nothing to do with you." Louise's sad voice made me jump as she suddenly spoke the other side of the door.

"Mum, what are you on about?" Nathan demanded.

"I need to give my relationship with Jeremy a chance," she replied.

Nathan rolled his eyes; he couldn't stand his mum's new boyfriend of five months. "Jeremy?! Come _on._" He crouched down to speak through the letterbox. "The guy's a total dildo!"

"Nathan, stop it, now," I warned him.

"You're always making fun of people!" Louise said hotly. "Nothing anyone says hurts you! Not everybody's like that!" I mean, I was, but that's only because I'd finally grown a spine since I split up with Julian and refused to let _anyone_ hurt me like that again.

"Has Jezza been crying again?" Nathan mocked through the letterbox. "Come on, open the door."

"I've changed the locks," Louise sadly said, and my mouth dropped open in complete shock, cigarette falling from my lips to the ground. She'd _what_?

At that, Nathan finally shot to his feet. "What?! You can't be serious!" he exclaimed disbelievingly.

"If you stay, he'll leave!" she insisted, and that made my blood boil. Was she picking her fucking boyfriend over her own _son_?!

"Are you fucking kidding me right now, Louise?!" I snarled, slamming my fist on the door. "You can't do that!"

"Blake, please, just stay out of this," she said.

"Where am I gonna live?!" Nathan panicked. "Mum, open the door!"

"Your things are by the garage," she told him, sounding on the verge of tears. That explained the 'charity bags.' "I've put some money in your rucksack. I'll call you in a few days."

"Mum. Mum, don't! Come on!" Nathan begged against the frosted glass."Mum?! MUM!" He began to bash his fists on the door like he was trying to break in, but I gently took one of his arms and pulled him away.

"Leave it, Nate," I said quietly, and he turned to look at me. He looked so…vulnerable. There was no cheeky Nathan smirk, no cocky comment. Instead, there was nothing but tears in his eyes. "Come on, we'll go back to my place. We'll figure this out, it'll be alright." Slowly he nodded. I grabbed two of his bags and put them in the backseat of the Polo, and he followed up with the two bin bags.

Cue the most uncomfortable car journey I'd ever been on. It always freaked me out when Nathan got this quiet, because it was the one way to know that shit was well and truly _fucked_. I hadn't turned the music back on due to the situation, and funnily enough, Nathan wasn't exactly in a talkative. In the ten minute drive to D Block of Wertham Estate where my flat was located, he probably uttered about four words as opposed to the four words per second he normally spat out.

"Do you want anything to eat?" I asked him once we'd stepped through the door to my little studio flat, trying to maintain a little bit of normalcy.

"Vodka coke. At least three shots," was his gruff reply before he plonked himself down on my cream sofa, kicking his legs up and lying with his hands behind his head, staring at the ceiling. I didn't even have the heart to reprimand him for the scuff marks his Converse left on the upholstery.

As he flicked through the channels on telly, I opened up the cabinet in the kitchen that served as the drinks cabinet and grabbed a half-full bottle of Smirnoff. Well, I say kitchen. Kitchenette was probably more apt. The entire flat was one room with a bathroom to the left of the front door. The kitchen/kitchenette was immediately to the right of the door. If you walked straight in front of you from the door then you found yourself in the living room, complete with three-person sofa, 30-inch flatscreen TV and coffee table. The telly was mounted against a halfwall that separated my double bed from the rest of the room to give me some closure while I was asleep, and along the far wall by the bed was my wardrobe. The white walls were plastered in posters of all my favourite things; comic books, Bring Me The Horizon, Nirvana, Slipknot, artsy Gothic prints, motivational quotes.

It was a very cosy flat that I was extremely grateful to my parents for helping me rent. I'd lost my full time job at a cute little coffee shop when word of my 'anti-social behaviour' and arrest got out, so my Mum and Dad were helping me keep (some) of my independence whilst I was otherwise engaged with my community service. They obviously weren't happy with my current situation, but they loved me and didn't exactly want to see me out on the street.

Unlike Nathan's mum, it would see. God, I still couldn't get over how cold someone could be to kick their only child out. It was brutal. No wonder Nathan chugged half of that vodka and Coke the second I placed it in front of him. As soon as he'd swallowed, he picked up his mobile and started scrolling.

"What are you doing?" I asked.

"Obviously looking for a place to stay, Sherlock," he muttered.

"Glad we've established I'm the Sherlock Holmes in this relationship," I replied at an attempt at a laugh, and somehow broke through as I managed to get a very Nathan smirk out of him.

"Yeah well, I'd rather be Doctor Watson than a prick in a deerstalker," he snorted before putting the phone to his ear. "Hey, Adam! How's Trix? How's the herpes?" A pause. "Alright calm down, it was a joke! Listen mate, I appear to have got myself into a tad bit of a pickle and could do with a place to crash for a bit. Don't suppose you could loan your ol' PE partner the spare room?" Another pause. "Not for long, only…the forseeable future." A third pause. "Hello? Helloooo? Adam? You there?" Nathan hung up. "The bastard put the phone down on me!"

"You accused him of having herpes then asked to live with him for the forseeable future. I can't imagine _why _he'd do that," I said dryly. And so began the most long-winded chain of phone calls I'd ever experienced sitting through. Apparently none of our former school chums wanted Nathan to stay with them, and he was getting more and more desperate with every hang-up.

"Billy, I need a favour, mate. Can I stay at yours? Come on, it'll be a laugh!"

"Liz, you don't mean that! You don't! Well I don't believe you!"

"Pauly! Pauly boy! The Paul-Meister! …hello?"

"Declan! My brother! Mate, don't suppose I can crash on the sofa for a bit, can I? …Yep. No, it's okay. I'll find somewhere else. No no, I'm good. I'm good." With a final sigh of defeat, he placed the phone down on the coffee table and collapsed back into the cushions. "I'm fucked."

My heart was breaking just looking at him. I'd never seen him so despairing before. "You fucking dingus, just stay with me until you can get yourself sorted!" I exclaimed. "How was that not the most obvious conclusion in your head?!"

"Stay _here_?" Nathan said almost disbelievingly. "Blakey, ya know I love and respect you and all that bullshit, but are you retarded? I can't stay with you! Think how much that will cramp my style when I want to bring a girl back to shag and you're here, listening from that hole you call a bedroom."

"Are you fucking serious?!" I spluttered.

"Serious as a heart attack, love," he replied. "I'm sorry, but I'm a man. I need man space."

"And where is that 'man space,' exactly?" I demanded. "A sleeping bag under the flyover?"

"You need to chill, Harper. I'll work it out, I always do." He raised both arms in a strong man style, turning his head to kiss his biceps both sides. "Fuckin' Superman over here. I'm untouchable."

"Alright," I sighed. "But don't you fucking dare say I never try to help you out."

"Hey, I would never say such a thing. After all, you were the one who washed my pants after I shat myself when I took too many pills that time."

"Can you please not remind me of that? I still have nightmares of you keeling over in the middle of the club with shit leaking out of your jeans."

* * *

06:45am on the dot. My alarm screamed and screamed before I flung my hand out from under the duvet to hit the Snooze button. Sitting up with a yawn, I rubbed my eyes and stewed in the regret of staying up drinking with Nathan until midnight. I'd attempted to convince him to stay with me right up until he left, but he insisted that he'd worked something out, so who was I to argue?

After my usual morning routine of shower, change into skinny jeans and vest, orange juice, Coco Pops and brush teeth, I pulled my sewing machine out of the bottom of the wardrobe and set it up on the table, sitting down in front of it with my freshly washed, paintless jumpsuit. God, this thing was hideous. Alisha had managed to make hers somewhat wearable so fuck it, I'd give it a try too.

Taking my fabric scissors to the left leg, I sheared off most of it to the point where all that was left was enough to form more of a playsuit with shorts rather than a jumpsuit. Once I'd hemmed both legs, I turned up the arms to a three-quarter length as well since we were doing our service over June to September, so by all logic it would be warm. If it wasn't, I could wear tights, long socks or leggings. Sorted.

I was in the process of getting my backpack sorted out, packing my lunch, the jumpsuit et cetera, when my phone buzzed with a text message. It was from Nathan.

**BEST FRIEND EMERGENCY. BRING SNACKS AND DRINKS TO COMMUNITY CENTRE.**

A second text buzzed in two seconds later. **Please.**

I let out a snort before replying to him. _**Sounds like a real emergency, snacks and drinks. Alright, I'll see you in the main hall before everyone else gets there. 10 mins.**_

**I don't say this enough, but I fucking love you. See ya in 10.**

Okay, so now on top of the backpack full of my own shit, I also had a Tesco bag-for-life that contained a 2-litre bottle of Coke, a couple of share-sized bags of crisps, some sausage rolls and a bag of Cadbury's buttons since he had a bit of a sweet tooth. Hell, I even made him two rounds of cheese and tomato sandwiches because that's what best friends do. Mother Hen act completed, I laced on my Converse, swung my backpack over my shoulder, grabbed the bag-for-life and headed out for Day 2 of ASBO Rehab.

As expected, I arrived in the empty community centre car park about twenty minutes before anyone else would even remotely consider arriving. As agreed, I opened up the front doors and wandered through to that clinically white coloured main hall. There was the faint smell of disinfectant in the air, along with some kind of manly sweat tang which was a tad repugnant, to say the least.

That was when I spotted Nathan. He was leaning against the vending machine, still wearing yesterday's clothes and talking despondently into his mobile. "-and you'll cry, and I'll move back in. Sorted. Everybody's a winner. Anyway, so call me, yeah? I'll be expecting your call. Okay."

"Nate?" I gently called out when he hung up the phone.

Nathan let out girlish scream and whirled around to face me, pointing an accusing finger. "Jesus fuckin' Christ, Blake! You cannot be creeping up on a man like that, especially one in such a delicate state as myself!"

"Dude, I am like the least quiet person on God's green Earth, how the fuck did you not hear me come in?" I retorted, before wrinkling my nose a little. "Fucking hell, is that smell you?! Did you not wash this morning?!"

"No, Blake, I did not on account of the community centre's fucking hot water being off," he countered.

"Community centre's hot- Nathan, did you stay here last night?!" I shrieked, and he belted over to me and clamped a hand over my mouth.

"Not so fuckin' loud!" he hissed. "If one of those other shitheads turns up and finds out I'm a homeless, my rep is dead! Like, deader than my grandma dead." Cue girlish scream #2 as I licked the palm of his hand to get him to let go. "You fucking animal!"

"You don't have to _be_ a homeless, you prick!" I said heatedly. "Just. Stay. With. ME!"

"I am not havin' this conversation with you again, my delusion little monkey," he replied. "Look." He pointed up at the mezzanine above us. "There's me new bedroom. It's got a mattress, I can keep some of my clothes up there, it's got all the mod cons."

"You know what? You're so right. Girls will definitely prefer being brought to a dingy community centre to get shagged than the flat you could share with your best mate," I said mordantly.

Nathan clapped me heartily on the shoulder. "There we go, Blakey. I knew you'd see it my way. Now why don't you hop your cute little arse up the stairs and leave the food by me bed then help me get all my shit into my locker? Thanks, angel."

"God, you're lucky I love you, bro," I snapped, dragging the bag-for-life to the stairs. After we then wrestled with getting all of Nathan's bags into a spare locker no one would use, we became painfully aware that it was now nearing on ten to eight and everyone was going to start arriving any second. I dusted off my jeans and sauntered off in the direction of the front doors, and that was when Nathan snagged me by the hand and yanked me back to his side.

"Where the fuck are you going?!" he demanded all panicky-like.

"Um, out the front door?" I said slowly, wondering if he was now so traumatized by the last 24 hours that he'd become even more retarded than usual.

"I think the fuck you are not!" he scoffed, beginning to pull me in the direction of the back of the buildings. "I am not having them other tossers work out I'm a homeless, which is exactly what they'll think seeing me walk outta here when I shouldn't be!"

"Do you really think any of them are that intelligent enough to work that out?" I huffed, but I allowed him to steer me right round the back of the storage area where a large iron roll-shutter was blocking a large window. "Oh hell no, am I going through there!"

"Oh hell yes you are, darlin'," he said smugly as he rolled up the shutter. He then squatted down and locked his hands to make a step for me. "Ladies first."

"Arsehole," I grumbled, but I hooked my foot into his hands and allowed him to boost me up so I straddled the window sill. I offered him my hand. "Come on then, I haven't got all day!"

"You're so pushy! Guys don't like that, ya know!" he exclaimed, taking my hand and putting all his weight into hauling himself up onto the sill. Unfortunately, his entire body weight proved a bit too much for my tiny little T-Rex arms, and the force of me trying to pull him up sent us catapulting out of the window. We landed with a crack on the concrete, Nathan letting out a cry of pain. Hm, weird. I'd really been expecting that to cause some serious damage - scraped elbow, bloody nose, cracked rib, maybe - but the landing had barely even forced a huff of air from my body.

"Motherfucker, that could have gone so much smoother," I complained, rolling around to my knees and smirking at Nathan who was busy rolling around the floor like someone had shot him in the chest.

"Oh my God! Oh fuck, it hurts! My back! I think I've broken my back!" he whined.

"Oh God, how will we cope without you today? Oh wait…you're fine," I said with a roll of my eyes. I gave him a swift kick in the ribs for good measure. Funnily enough, the sole of my trainer connecting with his bony side resulted in him jumping to his feet.

"You know, you need to stop hitting me so much!" he cried. "This is an abusive relationship, this is!"

"And you fucking love it," I retorted, giving him a shove towards the front of the building. "Let's move, dickhead."

Sure enough, our other four young offender buddies were waiting around the front, all of them staring at something on the wall. Frowning, I followed their gaze and found myself staring at something that made my blood run cold. There on the blackened wall, emblazoned in bright red dripping letters, was a very clear message.

**I AM GOING TO ****KILL ****YOU**

"Well that _is_ friendly, isn't it," I said dryly, taking a fag out of my backpack and sparking up. Seriously, who took the time to do this kind of shit? Stupid pricky children with nothing better to do with their lives, that's who.

"This is a joke!" said Curtis. "Did one of you do this?"

"Don't look at me cause I didn't do it!" said Kelly irately.

"I'll tell you who did!" Nathan came up behind us, unlit fag in his mouth. "It's that Banksy prick! There's a hidden meaning."

"Yeah. Evidently Banksy is in Wertham," I said scathingly, blowing some of my smoke in his face. "You knob."

"Nah, nah. It's like that monkey policeman with the banana and the Tescos bag!" Nathan insisted, putting his arm around Simon's shoulders.

"Maybe someone wants to kill us," said Simon tremulously.

"Er, why would anyone wanna kill _us_?" challenged Kelly.

"Yeah. I mean, look at us," I said sarcastically, twirling round in a circle like a model. "We're perfect examples of upstanding, model citizens." It was at that point Tony Probation Worker decided to appear and tell us to get to work.

"Have you seen this?" demanded Curtis, gesturing at the graffiti. "Someone's takin' the piss!"

"Yeah, it's terrible isn't it?" said Tony uninterestedly. "All this anti-social behaviour."

"Oh! Is he havin' a dig at us?" Nathan said around his fag, which he had actually managed to light at last.

Just then, Alisha's phone rang, causing Tony to have some kind of aneurysm. "Right! That's it! All of you, just give me your phones! No one's making any more calls today!" He held his hand out to Alisha. "Now! Come on."

"Are you allowed to take our phones?" she giggled, snapping a picture of him. He snatched it out of her hand before taking Curtis' phone, then Kelly's and Simon's. Nathan put up a fight for his, "I'm expecting a call from my mum!" It made no difference, Tony still took the phone. "Okay, take a message!"

When Tony got to me, I quickly said, "I don't have a phone. I'm um…Amish! Yeah. Amish. We're uh, not so big on the whole 'technology' thing." Of course, at that exact moment my phone decided to vibrate with a text, resulting in me obviously getting it confiscated as well. Irritated, the six of us headed inside to get changed, all of us glaring at Tony and Kelly spitting ,"Wanker!" at him.

* * *

"Is he allowed to take our phones?" asked Nathan whilst we were getting changed.

"I doubt it, the power-hungry bastard," I said, shutting my locker and lighting up my second cigarette of the morning. Jesus Christ, another few days of this shit and I'd have officially transitioned into becoming a chainsmoker.

"Yeah. He's probably using them to call one of those sex chat-lines," Nathan continued. Alisha, Kelly and I all laughed.

"Those sex lines will eat your credits," stated Curtis,

"Call them a lot, do you?" bantered Alisha.

"He's out there now filming himself on our phones, naked. Masturbating," Nathan felt the need to suggest.

I pretended to gag. "God, I'd need therapy for the rest of my life if I saw that."

"You mean more therapy than you've already had," Nathan snorted, resulting in a swift jab to the throat. "Son of a bitch! Abuse! Abuse!"

"Stop complaining for once, Nate, you're giving me a headache," I said, tightening the belt around my waist. God, I looked a little bit good in my modified jumpsuit, though I certainly didn't miss Alisha glaring daggers at me when she saw it. I had to suppress as smile at that; just because the little slut was jealous of how fit I looked without my tits on display didn't mean she had to stare at me like I'd torn a puppy apart with my bare hands.

"After putting up with you for seventeen years, I think I'm more than entitled to complain a little bit," he ribbed, blowing me a kiss.

"By that logic, putting up with your pasty Irish arse for that long entitles me to a four-month stay in a Thai relaxation resort and unlimited access to as much vodka as I need."

"How the fuck have you been friends with him for that long?" Curtis asked me.

I shrugged. "No one else has stuck around like he has, as hard to believe as that might be. He's a bellend-"

"I resent that!"

"-but he's a bellend who I can't imagine life without."

"I'm gonna be sick," Alisha mock-gagged, and I flashed a middle finger at her.

"Funnily enough, Alisha, some of us are capable of being around men without putting their penises in our mouths," I said sweetly.

"You wanna go, bitch?" she snarled.

"Nah, you're alright, love," I giggled. "Wouldn't want you to mess up your hair. Let's go, Nathan." And with that, Nathan and I departed the locker room together, stubbing my fag out on the door as I went.

* * *

Today we'd been given the _delightful_ task of cleaning up the graffiti off the wall. Well, it sure beat having to scrape up dog shit or whatever else Tony had had planned for us. We each took our own little spot on the wall. Well, I say all. Alisha saw fit to just lay back on one of the tables, jumpsuit stripped down to the waist so she could tan and mouth off about how someone could suck her dick.

The constant preening of herself made me want to cunt-punch her. Alisha was self-absorbed, small-minded and on the whole exactly what I had labelled her earlier: a slut. Apparently this didn't bother Curtis, who was looking at her with what I think he imagined was an attractive face, but just really made him look like he was trying to hold in a particularly explosive shite.

"After the storm," said Kelly suddenly. "Did any of yous lot feel like, dead weird?"

"Yeah, I had a strange tingling sensation in my anus!" exclaimed Nathan.

"All I had was one motherfucker of a stomach ache," I said, rubbing at the spot it had been.

Kelly turned to Simon, who hadn't said a word. "What, did you feel weird?"

"What you don't want to hear about my anus?" Nathan sounded wounded.

"Yeah totally. I can't think of anything I'd rather discuss than your arse," I said with derision. "I think that's more the conversation you should save for your next doctor's appointment. I'm sure they'd love to hear about your tingling bumhole." He grinned cockily at me for about the third time that day and we continued scrubbing away.

"Something happened," Simon admitted.

"What's that? _Squeak_ up!" That obviously came from Nathan.

"Something happened to me," said Simon quietly.

"Are you a virgin? Hi-hiii!" Nathan put on a ridiculous singing voice for that last bit.

"Shut up!" Kelly shouted at him, causing him to stop abruptly.

"What happened, Simon?" I prompted him encouragingly.

"It's nothing," said Simon, turning back to the letter _T_ he was trying to scrub off.

We scrubbed for about another thirty seconds, until Kelly suddenly threw herself at Nathan, slamming him backwards so that he nearly tripped over his bucket of water and fell into me, knocking me face-first into the damp.

"What was that for?" he cried as Kelly stormed off.

"What the fuck!" I shrieked, peeling myself away from the brick. "What's her problem?"

"Like fuck if I know!" said Nathan, sounding genuinely confused. "Jesus."

* * *

After another half an hour, the five of us decided we deserved a break. Tony hadn't bothered to come back to check on us and, to be frank, we probably wouldn't have cared if he had.

Simon, Curtis, Nathan and I headed into the main hall, where there was a foosball table and a few chairs, and obviously the vending machine. Alisha had buggered off somewhere, and Kelly still hadn't returned from her dramatic escape. Curtis and Nathan started up a game of foosball while Simon watched, and I curled up in one of the chairs with the _True Blood _book I'd brought from home. Despite trying to block out the boys' conversation, Nathan's voice had a way of drilling itself into my brain.

"It's a shame more women don't commit crimes. Why is that?" he said. "Still, we did get lucky on the whole." I looked up, wondering what he was on about.

"What d'you mean?" asked Curtis.

"There's three girls, and three boys. Perfect division, my friend. One for each of us! Even you're gettin' one, Weird Kid!" I bristled at his assumption that us girls would just want to sleep with the boys. He was my best mate but my God, he was so clueless sometimes, it actually hurt.

"There were four of us," said Simon quietly. He was, no doubt, referring to Mr Stabby, who hadn't even bothered turning up today.

"I'm talkin' about gettin' laid!" said Nathan as though it was obvious. He looked at Curtis. "So how're we gonna do this, man?" I sighed. He was genuinely being serious.

"Do what?"

"Er, hello? He obviously wants you to decide how to divide the three of us so each of you get a shag," I called over.

"She's right, man. How we gonna split them up? 'Cause I gotta tell ya, the one with all the frizzy hair? I don't see me and her gettin' it on."

Curtis snorted. "Because she's beautiful?"

"No, because she'd be way too much effort!" Nathan replied. "She looks seriously high-maintenance! You'd have to treat her really well. Pfft! Now Blake-" He pointed at me. Oh God, here we go. "She's fit enough. But obviously _I _can't shag her, it'd be like fucking my sister and this is not Norfolk, my friends."

"Get fucked, Nathan," I said hotly, shooting him the V.

"Love you, Blakey!" he called over, pursing his lips in a mocking kiss. I just rolled my eyes. "But the other one..."

"Kelly," Simon supplied.

"Whatever," Nathan scoffed. "A couple of Bacardi Breezers, I reckon she'll be good to go! I might need more than a couple myself, but who's counting?"

"Nathan, you _hate _chavs," I reminded him.

"I don't hate chavs with big tits," he replied with an extremely cocky smirk. Cue eye roll number two and me shoving my book into my backpack.

"I can't listen to this anymore," I muttered. "Nate, when you decide to stop deluding yourself that community service is gonna get you laid, come find me, I need to borrow a quid for the vending machine at some point in exchange for the lunch I so lovingly packed for you."

* * *

Once I was in the hallway, I saw Alisha sprawled along the orange sofa, applying yet more lipgloss to her already over-glossed lips. Not even paying her any attention, I collapsed on the other sofa opposite her. I couldn't be bothered to make any form of small talk, as she always seemed to find a way to turn the conversation to herself. Instead, I pulled a third cigarette out of my pocket and lit it, ignoring the No Smoking signs on the walls. Yep, Chainsmoker Blake was on her way to making an appearance.

A few minutes later Nathan came out of the main hall and into the hallway. He winked at me and I responded by giving him the finger. He just gave me typical cocky grin before he started attacking the vending machine like he had the day before.

Simon came out next, sitting down on the floor near Alisha's sofa and drawing his knees up to his chin, and finally out came Curtis, was putting away the buckets we'd been using before Alisha started speaking to him.

"When I was in Sixth Form you came to my school," she said. That was when Nathan appeared around from behind the sofa in one of the wheelchairs. "You gave this big talk about athletics, and all your medals and that."

"So I'm guessing you're not going to the Olympics?" Nathan quipped.

"Funny," said Curtis bitterly.

"So, what exactly did you get done for?" I asked. "Because no offence, mate, it seems like you fucked up big time."

"I heard he was dealing crack," said Alisha.

"What?! I wasn't dealing crack!"

"Nah, that's not it. I heard it was heroin," I put in.

"No, no, paper said it was steroids," said Nathan, who was gearing himself up for tormenting Curtis.

Alisha inhaled sharply and slouched down the sofa so she was laying down. "That stuff will shrivel your dick."

"It wasn't steroids!" insisted Curtis. "I'm not a cheat! That stuff in the papers was bullshit."

"Yeah, so what was it then?" Alisha demanded.

Nathan and I looked at him expectantly. Curtis hesitated, then sighed. "I got caught with a little bit of coke." Nathan tutted, Alisha looked away like she was bored, and I raised my eyebrows at him. "Alright? I messed up one time."

"Nobody gets community service for possession," stated Alisha.

"If it was anyone else, they'd've got a caution," said Curtis. "I get two hundred hours community service and a two year ban from athletics! They said, because of my 'profile' they needed to 'send a message'."

"You let yourself down," Nathan said slyly from the wheelchair. Curtis turned to him, a look of pure venom on his face. "You let the kids down, you let your parents down-"

It was like he'd thrown a bomb at Curtis. "SHUT THE FUCK UP!" he exploded, grabbing hold of Nathan by his jumpsuit. "All I ever did was train! You know _nothing_! I shouldn't even fucking be here!" He jabbed Nathan in the face.

"You can't hit someone in a wheelchair!" Nathan said breathlessly. Curtis spat, "Prick!" at him and released him so abruptly that the wheelchair got pushed back about a metre.

I snorted, and Curtis rounded on me. "You wanna say something to?"

"Yeah, actually. Life's a bitch. I get that you're pissed your athletics career's in tatters, I do. But come on, man. Stop thinking of all the past shit and look towards the future shit, because all this?" I gestured around the tiny hallway. "It can only get better."

Curtis gave me a look of, _Are you serious?_ and settled back into sulking against the wall. If it had been a cartoon, you'd have been able to see smoke coming out of his ears. He was seriously starting to piss me off with his 'oh boo hoo poor me' routine.

There was an awkward silence for a few seconds, then, "Do you wanna know what I got done for?" from Alisha.

"Not really," said Nathan.

"You know what? Go for it, actually," I said to her. "Any story is better than that last shitty sob story."

Smirking, Alisha proceeded to tell us the story of how she and some girl none of us knew had gone to a party and this girl had had a spaz attack about some people we didn't know that were doing each other. By this point the boys had all gathered in front of her like kids listening to their mum tell a story, while I stayed put on the other sofa.

"I'm driving us back into town. Chloe's all like, 'I feel sick!' and I'm like, 'Aha, don't puke in my car! Do not puke in my car!' That's when the police pull us over," Alisha was saying. I was starting to get bored by now, as were the boys. _Just fucking get to the point_! I wanted to shout.

However, it was her demonstration of what she'd done to a breathalyser that really caught the boys' attention, all of them kind of cringing their legs to stop their dicks bursting out of their trousers. I, however, actually managed to finally get the gist that she'd been done for drink-driving and attempting to suck off a breathalyser.

She finished her story with, "Now I don't know if this cop is gay or what, but he tells me I'm four times over the limit! That's bullshit! I didn't even wanna go to the party!"

I was about to reply with a snarky comment about how she should've stayed home then, when Kelly burst through the doors, falling to the floor. "He's gonna kill us!" she shouted fearfully.

I jumped to my feet, staring at the quivering, pale wreck of Kelly. What the fuck had just happened?!

* * *

**A/N- Please review! I always love to hear what you liked, what you didn't, thoughts and feelings in general! Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Two Playlist  
**_**Transparent – **_**Porcelain and the Tramps  
**_**All Signs Point to Lauderdale - **_**A Day to Remember**


	3. Fight or Flight

**A/N- Thank you very much, Guest1, Judging All Day Every Day, Guest2 and Ronnie H for reviewing!**

* * *

**Chapter Three – Fight or Flight**

We all just kind of stared as Kelly rushed up to the doors and locked them, exclaiming, "Shit!" as she did so. I dropped my cigarette on the floor and quickly stepped on it to stub it out. I was starting to panic. What was going on?

Nathan, meanwhile, was obviously _not_ worrying as he laughed at her and said, "Nice entrance, very dramatic!" while giving her slow, patronizing applause.

"The probation worker's gone mental! He's just attacked me!" Kelly said frantically. We all looked at her in complete shock. "Somethin' really weird is happenin'! I'm hearin' these voices in me head! It's like I can hear wot people are finkin'!"

"Have you been sniffing glue?" said Alisha tauntingly.

"The storm, the lightnin'! I dunno, it's just done somethin' to us!" shouted Kelly.

"Okay. If you can hear our thoughts," said Nathan, wheeling himself in front of her. "What am I thinking now?" He put his a finger to each side of his head.

"You think it's bullshit?!" she declared angrily.

"Course I think it's bullshit, you don't need to be a mind reader to know that!" Nathan scoffed.

"Why are you in a wheelchair?" she asked him.

"It was the storm!" Nathan put on a voice that made him sound all vulnerable and innocent. "The strange tingling sensation in my anus has spread through my body and now…I can't feel my legs."

"Correction," I said, holding up my hand. "He's in the wheelchair because he's a complete bell-end."

"You always make me feel so loved, Blakey," he muttered as Kelly kicked him in the shins. "Ow! Jesus!"

"Wait. What do you mean, the probation worker attacked you?" Curtis demanded.

"This does sound like complete shit," agreed Alisha.

"Sorry, but it kinda does," I concurred.

"He is out there and he chased me!" yelled Kelly.

"Something's happened to me to!" Simon suddenly piped up.

"Did you pop your cherry?" Nathan asked in a falsely cheerful voice. "Ah, we're all very happy for you!"

"Oh my God, Nathan! Will you please just shut the fuck up? Please?! Just for once!?" I shouted at him before turning back to Simon. "What're you on about?"

"Earlier on when we were in the locker room…I was invisible!" he stated. "I turned invisible!"

"Oh, bullshit," I said dismissively.

"So…she's psychic and you can turn invisible? That seems likely," jeered Curtis.

"Yeah, did anyone witness this miraculous disappearance?" asked Nathan.

"You were all there!" insisted Simon.

"Er, I think we _might_ have noticed you vanishing into thin air!" sneered Alisha.

"You didn't! I was standing right there! You didn't see me!"

_Didn't see __Weird Kid__? That's no different to most of the time, _I thought.

Kelly glared at me. "Why you being such a bitch? I thought ya were nice!"

"What? Did you just…holy shit!" I stuttered. She really could read minds! Holy crap. What in the fuck was going on?! Now, I feel the need to point out that while this had happened, Nathan had wheeled himself over to Simon and commanded him to turn invisible. Simon leaned his head back and made some really stupid straining noise. Instead of turning invisible, he just looked constipated.

As if this wasn't humiliating enough for the poor guy, Nathan made it worse by announcing, "Oh my God! He's disappeared!"

Simon looked around at us, then waved a hand in front of Nathan's face. "Can't you see me?"

"No," Nathan said in hushed tones, before throwing his empty Coke can at Simon's head. "You're invisible!" Alisha laughed cattily, and even I had to fight not to let out a small giggle. "You two are hilarious," Nathan continued, wheeling himself towards the door. "Really, keep takin' that medication!"

Kelly stood in front of him and seized the wheelchair arms to stop him going any further. "Don't go out there, he will kill you!"

"Of course he will, cause he's such a badass!" he snorted.

"_Don't_!"

"She's telling the truth!" Curtis declared all of a sudden. We all turned to look at him in disbelief. Oh God, what was wrong with _him_?

"And you know this how?" Nathan questioned, turning his chair to face Curtis. "I suppose you're psychic now, too?"

"All this! It's already happened!" said Curtis urgently, panting. "I opened that door. The probation worker…he killed you," he said to Kelly, who now looked terrified. "You were right there. You were dead. Everything froze. You were all just standing there. Time went backwards!"

"What are you saying, what, you turned back time?" demanded Alisha.

"If I could turn back tiiiime," I sang. Everyone looked at me with various looks of WTF. "Sorry," I said sheepishly. "Not the time."

"This just gets better by the second!" Nathan said mordantly, getting out of his wheelchair and walking over to the door.

"Nathan! Think about what you're doing!" I exclaimed panickedly, fear beginning to rise in my chest. I tried to grab his hand, but he just shook it off.

"Calm down, Blakey, everything's gonna be A-okay," he said smugly, still heading for the door.

"Everything happened again! Exactly the same!" Curtis insisted. "I'm telling you, do not open that door! No!"

"Nathan, don't!" I yelled just as he opened it.

Exactly two seconds after this he slammed it shut, bolting it as well. "He's right! The probation worker's gone mental!" We all screamed as the great hulking shadow of Tony appeared at the door, slamming against it, trying to get in.

We all huddled together in the middle of the room. Fucked. That's what we were. So completely, utterly and amazingly _fucked_. I was going to die. I was twenty-two and going to die.

"Maybe he's on crystal meth," suggested Alisha. "I mean, that stuff makes you crazy! My mate Chloe did it, she nearly shagged her _brother_! And he's really ugly!"

"I'm not being funny, love, but at the minute we really don't care about Chloe or her ugly brother!" I snapped, earning me an Alisha-glare. Tony was still outside the door, trying to bust it down.

"The graffiti! 'I'm going to kill you'! He wrote it!" said Simon fearfully.

"What did I say? I said there was a hidden meaning!" Nathan said exasperatedly just as Tony threw himself at the door again. "Or not!"

"Did anything happen to yous two?" Kelly asked me and Alisha.

"No!" Alisha said worriedly as I shook my head. "We should call the police!"

"He took our phones!" Simon said twitchily. "He's got all our phones!"

"Fuck everything!" I almost shouted. "It's like he planned this!" It was then that we realised Tony had stopped trying to break down the door, and his shadow outside the frosted glass was gone.

"He's stopped," said Curtis, like we hadn't noticed.

"You dickhead!" Alisha snapped at Kelly. "Why did you come back here? You shoulda gone for help!"

"What d'you know, bitch!" said Kelly angrily.

"Shut up, you chav," Alisha sighed, rolling her eyes.

Kelly rounded on Alisha. "D'ya know if ya call me a chav one more time, I'll kick ya so hard in the cunt your mum'll _feel_ it!"

"Her mum'll feel it? How does that work?" Nathan seemed to seriously be deliberating on this.

"Look, can we cut to the bitchfest later?" I ordered.

"He tried to kill me!" Kelly said furiously. "I came back here to warn yous lot and I coulda left ya!" She pointed around the group. "I'm sick of every single one of ya judging me, you can all _fuck_ _off_!"

"Look, stop!" I shouted, still shaking I was so scared. "We need to find a way out of here, now!"

"Whatever!" said Alisha, turning round and running. Curtis and Simon were right behind her, then Kelly, then Nathan and surprise, surprise, I brought up the rear. Fuck me, I hated running. It always reminded me of school PE lessons. But as we rounded the corner, Nathan slipped in something on the floor. He reached out to grab the nearest thing to steady himself, and that thing happened to be me.

But instead of keeping us both upright, I slipped too, and both of us plummeted down to the floor, both of us landing in the puddle of whatever it was. Something red…something sticky…something that smelt of salt and rust…

"Is that blood?!" Kelly shrieked. Nathan and I scrambled to our feet, looking at each other in horror. We were covered in the stuff: our hands, our arms. Nathan started frantically rubbing his hands on his jumpsuit, shouting, "Oh fuck! Jesus Christ! Fucking…get it off me!"

I, on the other hand, just stood there. I couldn't breathe. I just stared at the puddle of crimson liquid on the floor, stared at my bloodstained hands. I felt faint. My stomach twisted and I retched.

"Blake? Oi, Blake?" I heard Kelly say as if from far away. "Are you alright? You look like you're gonna spew."

I tore my eyes away from the blood puddle and looked at her. "Yeah. Yeah, I…I'm fine." I followed the streamline of blood up one of the lockers, where it was trickling out of the vents. "Is that locker…bleeding?" I pointed to it before rapidly backing up until I was standing next to Nathan.

Curtis approached the locker tentatively, reaching out and withdrawing his hands a couple of times before finally taking hold of the locker latch. I could hear Alisha behind me. She sounded like she was going to cry. Curtis pulled the latch up and wrenched the door open, backing away hastily as a body fell out. We all screamed.

It was Mr Stabby. Poor, butchered, aptly nicknamed Mr Stabby who now resembled one of those hacked-at pigs that hung in a butcher's window. Now I really was in danger of puking my guts out.

"It's Gary," Simon said quietly. Oh so _now_ I got to learn his name.

"I did wonder what had happened to him," Nathan said meekly, repulsion etched upon his face.

The walls started to spin around me as I stared at Gary's limp, bloody form. I was fainting. "Oh God," I mumbled as the room lurched. I grabbed hold of Nathan's arm to stop myself going down.

"Hey, hey, easy, easy," he said gently, wrapping his arms around my shoulders and propping me back up, allowing me to lean against him. "I've got ya, Blakey, you're alright. It's okay."

"It's...it's not okay..." I said weakly, closing my eyes and pressing my head into his shoulder.

"He's gonna kill us!" sobbed Alisha.

"Please stop saying that," I mumbled, opening my eyes again and attempting to stand unaided as the feeling returned to my legs. "I'd rather my last moments be spent in complete delusion."

"Turn back time!" Nathan ordered Curtis. "Stop this happening!"

"I dunno how it works!" Curtis said anxiously.

"Oh, great! That's really useful!" said Nathan sarcastically.

"Okay, let's not freak out-" I tried to say. In retrospect, given the reaction I'd just had, me telling anyone not to freak out was a tad hypocritical.

"Easier said than done, Blake!" he spluttered, looking very pale.

Alisha, meanwhile, looked like she was going to burst into tears as she stared at Gary's remains. "Come on. Don't look at it," Curtis said gently, taking her hand.

Suddenly, Curtis' face changed. He looked like he was in a trance as he started pulling at Alisha. "I've gotta have sex with you right now!" he announced as Alisha struggled to get him off her. "You're so beautiful. Let's go! Let's do it right now, raw!"

"Get off me, you freak!" she shrieked, finally getting him off her. The second he let go of her arms, his face fell and he looked dazed and confused.

"What?" He looked at us all. Alisha went to slap him, but he caught hold of her by the wrist, and his reaction to the skin-to-skin contact was exactly the same. "You're so hot!" he proclaimed, trying to pull down the zip at his crotch. "I'm gonna bone you! I'm gonna shag you senseless!"

"Let go!" Alisha screeched, prising him off her for a second time.

Again, the second he let go of her arms he was fine, albeit left with that same moronic expression. "What did I do?"

"Er, ya said you was gonna shag her," Kelly stated bluntly.

"And you were gettin' your chap out!" Nathan added gleefully, pointing to Curtis' half-down zipper.

"Honestly, dude, it looked like you were about to force yourself on her," I said awkwardly.

"Shut up!" Curtis gasped in disbelief, looking down at his private area.

"It's when you were touching her," noted Simon. We all stared at Alisha, who, like I had been, was staring at her shaking hands in terror. Before he could react, she pressed a hand to Simon's neck.

It wasn't pretty. All the veins near where she had touched seemed to grow even more purple as Simon twisted his head to look at Alisha hungrily. "I'm so hard for you! I wanna rip your clothes off and piss on your tits!"

"What is happening to me?" Alisha shouted, dropping her hand from Simon's neck.

"Holy motherfucker. That…is so wrong," I said disgustedly.

"You sick bastard!" Nathan said with revulsion. Nathan and I having the same thought; at least one thing in all of this mentalness was somewhat normal.

Before anyone else had the chance to voice their opinions on Simon's fucked up sexual fantasies, Tony burst through one of the windows, the glass shattering around him.

I screamed at the top of my lungs. He was making rabid noises like some kind of insane bear. His eyes were wide, bloodshot and full of hatred. Hatred for all of us. He was going to kill us. Everyone backed up instinctively, but I was too busy staring at Tony to move. It was like I was rooted to the spot. I was his clearest target.

Tony threw himself at me. I had no time to move, so I stood there and squeezed my eyes shut again, bracing myself for the impact and my impending death. Only...it never came.

Tony had launched himself at me Superman-style, fist first, but the second that fist connected with my stomach, there was an almighty sickening crunch sound, followed by an animalistic howl coming from the probation worker's mouth. I had felt no pain.

Eyes flying open, I looked and saw Tony gripping his wrist with his hand in the air. His fingers were pointing every which way, clearly very broken. Had...had I done that?! "W-what the fuck?!" I whimpered, my hands clawing at my stomach. Everything felt completely normal. I turned to face the others and all of them looked completely aghast, mouths dropped open.

"Blake, look- BLAKE!" Nathan suddenly yelled, and the next think I knew I was on the floor, skidding halfway down the hall. Another scream of pain had followed, but it wasn't from me; not only had Tony broken his hand when he punched me, but this second tackle had done something to his shoulder as he flailed around clutching it. When he moved his non-broken hand, I could see part of his shoulder was popped up much higher than the rest. He'd dislocated it. The weirdest fucking thing?

I. Hadn't. Felt. It.

Was I paralysed?! No, that couldn't be it, I was walking, talking, moving around like I was totally fine. Only I clearly wasn't. Connection with my body had just caused an eighteen-stone man to break his hand and shoulder. It was like this morning, when I hadn't felt my fall from the window. It was like I was made of stone or something...like I'd become Thing from _Fantastic 4_.

Scrambling to my feet, I wanted to be ready for when Tony inevitably went for Round 3 of Let's Kill Blakey. Only this time, Kelly beat me too it. Tony lunged for me yet again, but she appeared from around the corner and clubbed him in the back of the head with a paint can as Nathan darted forward, hooked his hands under my arms and dragged me away from the carnage.

The club from the paint can had caused the probation worker to collapse to the ground mere inches away from the group of us, not moving. I removed myself from Nathan's grip and stared at Tony's…body?

"What did you do?" whispered Nathan. I looked from him, to Kelly, to the dented, bloodstained paint can, then to the dented, bloodstained skull of Tony. Oh holy shit, this was bad. Very…very bad.

"Is he dead?" Alisha whispered, he voice a few octaves higher than normal.

"Well, I'm no doctor but…you see the way the back of his head's caved in like that?" groaned Nathan.

Tony suddenly opened his eyes, his hand shooting out for Kelly's ankle and screamed out, "Chav!" In response, Kelly started mashing his head in with her foot while shouting, "I. AM. NOT. A. CHAV!"

We stared, wide-eyed and horrified, at the now most certainly dead probation worker. Kelly had done some serious damage, enough damage that meant his head now resembled a flattened cat on a road.

"That should do it," Nathan said weakly, his hands gripping his head.

"Oh, I am definitely gonna puke now," I moaned, but all I could do was stare at the body of Tony. No…not the body. The corpse. OH SHIT. Fuck! It was a fucking corpse! He was dead! The probation worker was dead! I had been an accomplice in a murder! Oh shit. Oh fuck. Oh bollocks! THIS COULD NOT BE HAPPENING. But it was.

"You killed our probation worker!" exclaimed Alisha, like Kelly didn't already know.

"This is very, very bad," said Nathan, voicing my earlier thoughts exactly.

"I feel sick," gagged Alisha, covering her mouth and turning away.

"He woulda killed us!" Kelly tried to sound defensive, but instead sounded close to tears.

"We should call the police! It was self-defence!" Curtis said hopefully.

"Yeah. Yeah! We show them the dead boy in the locker," said Alisha. "They'll do some CSI shit and figure it all out!"

"They won't believe us!" Kelly shouted hopelessly.

"We tell them the truth!" said Curtis. "We stick to our story!"

"And what's our story?!" she demanded. "That he can turn invisible and you can turn back time?! It doesn't matter what we tell 'em, they'll say we're lying! They'll say we killed 'em both!" She pointed at Curtis. "No one's gonna believe ya, not anymore!"

Kelly's knowledge of the justice system really caught me off guard. Not that it calmed me down, of course. "Shitting hell!" I cried. "This seriously can't be happening!"

"Well, you better believe it Blake, cause it is," said Nathan, now looking like he might cry as well, but he did place an arm around my shoulders. I wrapped my arms around his waist to try and get some normalcy, to try to feel _something_ other than the complete and utter terror I felt at A) becoming an accomplice in what was essentially a double homicide and B) finding out that apparently every nerve ending in my body had decided to shut down.

"If there's no body, there's no crime!" Simon said. We looked at him. What was he saying? That we just bury the bodies and forget about them? "We should bury them under the fly-over." Yes, yes he was.

"You can't be serious!" I yelped. "How obvious will that be if we're trying to drag two corpses up there?"

"Yeah, how do we do that?" whimpered Alisha. "Someone's gonna see us!"

"No, no, no!" said Nathan quickly. "Right, we just give 'em a quick-" he made a whistling noise to indicate we should clean them up. "We put them in those wheelchairs, we wheel them up there and if anyone sees us, we're just a bunch of young offenders taking a couple of specials for a walk in the sunshine!"

"That might work," I said. "But I'm telling you right now that I am not touching any form of dead body."

* * *

After that, it was like we were all running on automatic. The boys cleaned Gary and Tony up as best as they could and stuck them in the wheelchairs, hoodies over their bloodstained clothes. We wheeled the bodies up to the fly-over as if it was the most normal thing in the world to be doing, like pushing a baby in a pushchair.

"I can't believe this is happening," I muttered again, staring at the corpses in the makeshift grave we'd dug.

"I'm pretty sure this breaches the terms of my ASBO," joked Nathan feebly, leaning on his shovel.

"We don't tell anyone about this, yeah?" instructed Kelly. "About the storm, or what it did to us or anything."

"We're about to bury our probation worker, I don't think we need to be drawin' any attention to ourselves!" said Nathan in about the most serious tone I'd ever heard him use.

"Mate, there is seriously nothing else we can do," I said, throwing a shovel-load of mud into the grave. "It's all or nothing, man. I'm in. Fuck it."

"I don't want anyone to know!" said Alisha fiercely, starting to chuck dirt over the corpses as well. "I cannot be a freak!"

"Bit too fucking late for that one, darling!" I said heatedly.

"What about you?" said Kelly, pointing at Curtis. There was a poisonous silence. Oh, fuck no, he was not going to tell anyone about this!

"There's no going back now, man," Nathan said to him. "You're just as screwed as the rest of us! You're black _and_ famous, you're probably more screwed!"

"I shouldn't even be here!" he spat, also starting to bury the bodies.

"Yeah? Me either! Yet here we both are!" I snapped, so sick of his self-pity. "So get over it and get on with it, yeah?" This earned me a glare from him that would of had me floored if looks could kill.

"Just then. When he was touching ya," said Kelly to Alisha. "How were ya doing that?"

"I don't know," Alisha said quietly, again looking on the verge of tears.

"What about you?" she directed at me.

"I haven't got a fucking clue," I said, running a hand over my chest again. "I don't get it. It's like...it's like I couldn't feel anything that tried to hurt me."

There was a few moments of silence as we continued to bury the bodies. Then Nathan looked at Simon and asked, "Didn't you say you wanted to piss on her tits?" Simon looked completely mortified. "It's probably best to keep that kinda thing between you and your internet service provider!"

"Leave him alone Nathan!" I reprimanded. "It weren't him, it was Alisha's weirdo power thing!"

"Are you alright?" Curtis asked Alisha, who just gave him a look that said I don't want to talk about it.

"So hold on," Nathan said, pausing his digging. "All of you have some kind of 'special power'! Everyone can do something except me! He can do something-" he pointed at Simon. "_He_ can do something and I can't! That's ridiculous! Look at him! Where does that make any sense?!"

"Maybe you can do something," mumbled Simon. "You just haven't found out what it is yet."

"Yeah! What if…what if I can't feel pain!" There was a hilarious moment as Kelly and I both swung our hands out and smacked Nathan either side of his head. "Ow!"

"Did ya feel that?" shouted Kelly while I just laughed.

"Will the two of you stop hittin' me!?" he exclaimed, rubbing both sides of his head.

"Apparently _I'm _the one who can't feel pain, moron," I reminded him. "Best we keep on looking for your power, what say you, Watson?"

"I say stop fucking talking like that 'cause you sound like a right wanker."

Once we'd finished burying our dirty little secret, we all dispersed in opposite directions to go home. I jogged behind Nathan and grabbed hold of his arm. "Hey Blakey," he mumbled. "What're you doing?"

"Need to get my car, don't I," I said quietly, and for once, the two of us were completely speechless. Once we reached the community centre car park, I finally found my voice. "What...what happened back there?"

"I was hoping you'd be the one to answer that, Supergirl," he feebly joked.

"I don't know. I- I really don't know," I said hysterically. "It makes no sense! Do I not feel pain?! Am I invincible?! If I jump off a building, will it kill me?! I don't get it! I don't get any of this! I should be dead. He should have killed me back there...I should be dead..."

"Hey!" Nathan grabbed hold of me, his fingers digging into my shoulders. I felt pressure, sure, but the biting feeling of fingernails embedded in my skin? Not even an inkling of it. I truly felt nothing. "Don't fuckin' say that! You're not dead! _You_ cannot be dead! I need you here, with me, to stop me fuckin' everything up and to remind me to put trousers on in the morning! It was you or that psycho wanker, and I'm glad it was him." He gave me a small shake. "You, dead? Don't be fuckin' stupid, Blakey. Don't even make that joke."

I just stared at him, tears in my eyes. "Stay with me tonight? Please? Please don't make me go home alone. I'm so fucking scared. Please don't leave me."

He leaned forward and pressed a sloppy kiss to my forehead. "Got any pizza?"

"In the freezer, probably. Beer in the fridge as usual."

"Then count me in."

* * *

**A/N – See, Nathan's not that bad...sometimes. I appreciate this chapter is a tad shorter than the last two but I was really on a roll with the writing on this one and it seemed like an apt place to end it. I got a great amount of feedback on the last chapter so I'd love for that to keep going! Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Three Playlist  
**_**Going to Hell – **_**The Pretty Reckless**


	4. Stepdad Porn

**A/N – Hi guys, first things first, I am so sorry for the lack of updates the last few months. I have been in a constant battle with my mental health since last summer and sometimes, my mental health wins. I really hope you can forgive me for my radio silence and I _really_ hope this chapter makes up for it! As usual, thank you so so much to Guest, Judging. All Day Every Day, Ronnie. H, Toni, jojomonsterbunni, unholycrown and nyxovertop for your lovely reviews!**

* * *

**Chapter Four – Stepdad Porn**

I don't think I slept for even two hours that night. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Tony's feral face, saw the blood crusted over his nose, saw his bared teeth, heard that deep, animalistic breathing. I saw the evil in him as he charged at me. I heard the crunching sound as his fist had connected with my chest. I heard that awful splattering sound as Kelly smashed his head in with her foot.

I saw the breath leave his body as he died.

I tossed, I turned, I curled up into the foetal position, I starfished over the entire double bed. Nothing I did helped me get to sleep. Once the sun began peeping over the top of the bleak London flats surrounding me and the birds started singing, I decided that my attempts were clearly futile and admitted defeat, throwing the duvet off me and standing up. Oh fuck me, my head hurt. Maybe it had been a bad idea for me and Nathan to drink all that alcohol the second we'd stepped through the door.

Peeping over the top of the half-wall, I saw the curly-haired one snoring away on the sofa, all wrapped up in a spare blanket. At least he'd managed to get a full night's Zs in. My sofa definitely beat a grungy mezzanine in a community centre. Maybe now Nathan would see sense and agree to stay with me until he got himself back onto his feet.

Stretching my arms over my head, I stuck my feet into my slippers and – as quietly as I could – began to pad around the studio flat in my sleep shorts and vest, clearing away the various bottles and cans strewn around the tables and kitchen counters. Yes, the pyjamas were more than slightly revealing, but Nathan and I had had one of those friendships where at the age of six, if we'd got covered in paint or food or mud then our mums would just pop us in the same bath together. We'd seen every part of each other, even as teenagers, so this really didn't bother me in the slightest.

I cleaned up as much as I could as quietly as I could, but eventually it got to the point where I needed to get the hoover out and Nathan was still fast asleep. Seriously, it was like he sank into a minor coma whenever his head hit a pillow. With a small smile, I crouched down next to his head. "Nathan? Naaaathan?" I whispered.

He let out a low groan and turned away from me. "Not now, Mum. I told you, no school today..."

Biting back a snort, I brought my mouth closer to his ear. "Oh Naaaate…"

"Muuuum, get off!"

"NATHAN!" I yelled, and he let out a startled squeak like a ten-year-old girl, rolling straight off the sofa...and straight onto my bare foot.

"Arhhh!" I screamed out, wrenching my toes out from underneath him as he lay on the floor, moaning and cradling his head. "Jesus Christ, lay off those midnight trips to Sultan's Kebabs, you fat fuck!"

"That's karma, that is! Karma!" he spluttered, scrabbling to his feet and jabbing a finger at me. "Why you out here disturbing my beauty sleep like that?! I was having a lovely dream!"

"Oh yeah?"

"Yeah! I was shaggin' Megan Fox! She was wearin' that lovely schoolgirl outfit from _Jennifer's Body_...it was a crackin' dream!"

"Charming." I rolled my eyes. "But to go back to your first question, have you completely forgotten about our community service?! You know, that thing we're sentenced to two hundred hours of? That thing we were doing when we killed a bloke yesterday?!"

"Shhhh!" Nathan hissed, clamping a hand over my mouth. "What if the FBI are listenin' through the walls?!" Cue second girlish scream of the morning as I licked his hand to make him let go. "You are one dirty little bitch!"

"We're in England, you prick," I deadpanned. "If anything, it's MI5. No one is gonna be listening in to my shitey little flat, are they? They're probably preoccupied with fucking terrorists."

"Better to be safe than sorry, I say."

"...Just get dressed, Nathan. We need to get out of here in an hour."

* * *

I couldn't get it out of my head. The whole time we were getting ready, herding Nathan into the car like cattle, the drive to the community centre. It was like it was suffocating me.

We'd killed someone, buried them and discovered we each had some kind of power. Fuckin' _superpowers_. You couldn't make this shit up. I couldn't feel anything that touched me, I felt no pain. Was I indestructible? Would I be able to feel other sensations? What if I had sex? Did I experience pleasure? I didn't _know_, and it was the unknown that pissed me off more than anything. I could be a right control freak at the best of times – something inherited from the PTSD of being in a physically and emotionally abusive relationship – and the fact I had absolutely zero control over this 'superpower' did my head in no end.

"Want a bite?" Nathan offered me through a full mouth, brandishing a half-eaten packet of Quavers at me as we made our way into the community centre hallway.

I shook my head. "Not feeling great right now, but cheers for offering me food that _I _paid for."

"You know me, Blakey, all heart," he said proudly, pushing open the door of the locker room.

Not surprisingly, Kelly and Alisha were already changed and heading out of the door to the main hall. Simon was looking at something on his phone and Curtis was still changing. I opened my locker and stripped off my jeans, stuffing it into the locker and pulling out the community payback jumpsuit. I zipped it to a point where you could still see my Nirvana t-shirt, pulled up my socks and was about to head out when Nathan suddenly clicked his fingers at me to get my attention. I closed my locker, and he did the same. He whistled to get me, Simon and Curtis to gather around him.

"Alright," he whispered, zipping his own jumpsuit up halfway, leaving his black t-shirt on show. "So, if anyone asks what happened yesterday, we say nothin'. Right? It was a completely normal day." We all nodded and, in turn, headed into the main hall. Soon after, a pale woman with long, dark hair came out of the probation office and asked us to stand in a line, saying she needed to speak to us.

"Gary and my colleague Tony have both been reported missing," she told us. I stiffened slightly. Shit. Why, _why_ had we not realised that would happen!? Of course they'd been reported missing! They both had families…families that were now grieving for their missing sons or boyfriends or whatever.

"Their families are very worried about them," the woman carried on. "Have you seen anything unusual? Anything at all?" We all stood in silence, willing her to leave us. That was when Nathan raised his hand. We turned to look at him. What the fuck was he doing?! "You saw something?" the woman asked.

Nathan nodded. "A few days ago, I go into the toilets. Gary and Tony are in there, they're butt naked. Tony has Gary by his hair, like this-" he grabbed the back of his head. "And he's just doin' him. Doggy style." This was where Nathan saw fit to add hip-thrusting gestures. "And he's all 'who's your daddy? I'm your daddy! I'm Big Daddy!'-" cue another disturbing gesture. "-'oh yeah, you like that? Oh yeah, I'm Daddy Cool!'-" yet another explicit gesture. "So I'm guessing," he continued calmly, hands on hips. "That they've run away to continue their illicit, homosexual affair and I ask you, in this world of intolerance and prejudice, who are we-" he gestured at our little group. "Who are _we_ to condemn them?"

The woman gave him a look of sheer disbelief, like she genuinely couldn't even comprehend the words that had just left that Irish idiot's mouth, before walking back into the probation office. I waited for the door to close firmly before I rounded on him. "What in the name of all that is holy was that?!"

"That, my ill-informed princess, was me throwing a depressed penguin a lovely chunk of red herring," he said smugly.

"You cannot be serious! We needed to keep this as bland and boring as we possibly could!" I fumed. "An 'oh no, we have no idea what you're talking about' kind of thing! Not whatever the hell you just did, you prick!"

"Oh Blakey." Nathan patted the top of my head condescendingly. "You're so cute when you're mad over unnecessary shit."

"Unnecessary- you know what, I am not even having this conversation with you. But just know that when we're all in prison and you're getting arse-raped cause you dropped the soap, I will not be helping you!"

Jesus, if we weren't screwed before, we definitely were now.

* * *

Miss New Probation Worker never came back out of the probation office, so the six of us decided to head up to the roof. We stood by the edge, looking over the lake. We'd only been stood there about ten minutes when the front doors to the community centre opened and out she came, looking severely depressed. She stood outside for a few minutes before just turning and heading towards the car park.

The second she left our line of sight Nathan removed his fag from his mouth and said, "Well I think we got away with it!"

"Do you actually believe that?" asked Curtis. "Or are you just really dumb?"

"I actually believe that!" Nathan declared. "I mean, I was there. I should have one of these bullshit powers!"

"You can have mine!" said Kelly irately. "You wanna hear what people are thinkin' about you?"

Nathan took a drag on his cigarette. "Not so much, no. I want somethin' good. Y'know, somethin' from the A-list."

"Maybe you can fly?" said Simon tentatively.

"He's not gonna be able to fly!" said Alisha superficially.

"Yeah! There's always someone who can fly!" Nathan said eagerly, climbing on top of one of the chairs.

"I wouldn't do that, Nate. It's not high enough. Try the edge of the building," I suggested.

"Ha fucking ha, Blake," he said, before leaping up and forward about half a foot...only to land in a painful, moaning heap on the floor. "No…that's not it."

"Told you it weren't high enough," I taunted.

"You're a right laugh this mornin', aren't you Blakey?" he said with an eye roll.

I shrugged. "I'm running on about half an hour of sleep; apparently me and survivor's guilt don't mix well together."

"So…what happens now?" asked Curtis. "Is this it? We're gonna be like this forever?"

"What if we're meant to be like…superheroes?" said Simon.

"Oh my God, _yes_!" I exclaimed. "I call Batgirl!"

"Funny. No offence, but in what kind of fucked-up world would that be allowed to happen?" said Nathan.

"I did not sign up for that!" snapped Alisha.

"None of us did," I snapped back at her. "So maybe we should learn to make the best of the situation we're in, babes." Alisha death-glared me so violently I was half expecting my head to catch fire; there was no way me and this girl would _ever_ be friends.

Nathan looked at Simon and scoffed, "Superheroes? I love this guy. You prick!"

"What if there's loadsa people like us all over town?" Kelly wondered.

Nathan shook his head dismissively. "No. That kind of thing only happens in America!" He draped an arm around my shoulders comfortingly. "This will fade away. I'm tellin' ya, by this time next week, it'll be back to the same old borin' shit."

"I hope so," I said quietly, leaning my head back on his chest. "I really do.

* * *

The day came and went in a blur. Miss New Probation Worker only came to see us once, informing us of today's mundane child(ish) labour which was…cleaning the community centre's main hall from top to bottom.

"I should be thankin' everyone for cleaning my new living quarters, really," Nathan told me as we dumped our mops and buckets in the storage cupboard. We were the last two left, everyone else had buggered off to get changed and leave. "It's a shame I can't tell them I'm homeless when I think about it."

"Except you don't have to be homeless," I reminded him. "Surely last night was enough to convince you that my sofa is better than a shitey community centre?!"

"Last night was purely for your benefit," he insisted, flicking a damp rag at me. "What kind of man would I be if I left my bestest mate on the verge of a mental breakdown?"

"Touché. I'll give you that one," I allowed, wiping dirty floor water off my face with a smile. "I really did appreciate you being there. I probably don't say that enough."

"Easy on the sentiment there, Blakey," he snorted. "I might start thinkin' you're comin' onto me."

"In your wildest fucking dreams, babe." I laughed aloud for the first time in twenty-four hours, and it felt pretty damn good. "The day I start coming on to _you_ is the day that something has gone drastically, terribly wrong in my life."

"And I look forward to that inevitable day," Nathan smirked, moving to smack my arse as I let out another shriek of laughter. This was...strange. Nathan had never, ever tried to touch my arse. Sure, he'd commented on it numerous times – he was Nathan, I was a warm-blooded female, of course he'd commented on it – but touching seemed a little too over the mark for the two of us. A little too close. A little too intimate.

I brushed it off; he'd probably got overexcited and forgot where he was and what we were doing. Yeah. That was it. It was just a joke… "Do you want me to hang around tonight?" I asked him, clearing my throat slightly to bring down the blush I just _knew_ I'd be sporting. "I can order in a pizza?"

Nathan shook his head. "Hard pass on that, Blakey. I need some man time, my testosterone levels are dangerously low after spending almost forty-eight hours in your company. Might do a bit of decoratin', turn this place into a right nice man-cave."

"Decorating. Sure. Sounds like real man-time," I snorted. "Alright, I'll get crack-a-lackin' then. See you tomorrow morning, bright and early and all that shit."

"Sleep tight," he grinned. "Don't let the bed bugs crawl into your vagina."

"What the fuck is wrong with you, Nathan?" I sighed, smacking his head before wandering off to the locker rooms to get changed.

Walking out of the front doors five minutes later, I reached into my bag to grab a cigarette, but ended up taking out my phone instead as it vibrated with a text. Flicking it up to unlock it, I glanced down at the screen.

**\- One New Message -  
J**

**Missing you, Princess. How come you never come round to see me any more?**

My blood ran cold when I read through the message. No. No, no, no, he wasn't supposed to contact me! We hadn't seen each other since That Night, the night Nathan and I both got arrested. Why couldn't he get it in his head?! Oh who was I kidding. If me getting Nathan to call the police on him didn't keep him away from me, a screaming match in a bowling alley certainly wouldn't.

_**Leave me alone, Julian. I have nothing to say to you.**_

**Don't be like that, Bee. I seem to remember you had plenty to say the last time I saw your gorgeous face. How's community service going, by the way?**

_**Fine, not that it's any of your business. How's the broken toes?**_

**Healed, thanks for asking. Come on, babe, just come round. Have a drink with me. For old times. I miss you.**

_**What, so you can try to sweet-talk your way into my knickers, then smash my face in again? I think the fuck not, pal. Fuck off and leave me alone.**_

**Just remember Princess, you'll never find someone else, someone who loves you. No one will want you like I do.**

_**Oh yeah? Well I'd rather be alone for the rest of my life then let another piece of shit like you control me again. Prick.**_

**This isn't over, bumblebee. You're mine, never forget that.**

Tears pricked at my eyes. Choosing to ignore Julian's final text, I shoved my phone in my back pocket and started up a powerwalk to my car, suddenly desperate to get home. I was _not_ that terrified girl in love with a violent, abusive dickhead any more. I was strong, I was street-smart, I was independent. Julian would _never _hurt me again. _Nothing_ would ever hurt me again. I could make sure of that now.

* * *

Over the next few days, a kind of pattern set in. I'd arrive at the community centre, find some entertaining way of waking Nathan up, deliver him the latest Bag for Life that I'd stuffed with food, the others would turn up, we'd get changed, the new probation worker (Sally) would give us our monotonous task for the day, we'd do said monotonous task until we could leave.

It was during those monotonous tasks that a smaller pattern set in: Nathan would have some kind of hissy fit about how he didn't have a power, Kelly would punch him, I'd laugh, Simon would film us like the creepy little pervert he was, Alisha and Curtis would flirt, and Nathan and I would banter between ourselves. It _wasn't_ flirting, despite what Alisha and Kelly were fond of saying. Clearly they didn't understand the eclectic – and fucking hilarious – brand of banter Nathan and I had specialised from the day we discovered the appropriate way to swear.

I hadn't heard a single world from Julian fucking Quinn since that day at the community centre either. I wasn't stupid enough to believe that he'd got the message that I never wanted to hear from him or have anything to do with him. No doubt he was waiting in the shadows like the fucking psychopath he was, just waiting for the right time to catch me off my guard again. So fucking what, was my attitude to that.

Every passing day since that texting exchange had ended up being a whirlwind of cleaning graffiti and scraping up dog shite. Now, on Day Seven of our community service, Sally had handed us litter pickers and set us loose on the streets to clean up.

"And what, cause you're all special and I'm not?" Nathan was demanding as we headed into town. "Yeah, well I doubt it. You can think what you like, but I've got a -" Cue stereotypical-sounding gay voice. "- 'superpower', and I just need to find out what it is!"

"Oh my God, I am getting so bored of you saying that!" I groaned, hitting him in the back of the leg with my picker. "Play a different record, I am fucking begging you!"

"Yeah. Maybe you're just super-retarded!" put in Alisha, sounding exasperated.

"Maybe I've got a whole Spider-Man vibe going on!" Nathan continued, completely blanking us both. "Maybe I can climb stuff and do spider shit!"

"Yeah, cause that makes sense," sneered Curtis. "Why would you be able to climb stuff?"

"I don't know! How is it that you can turn back time, apparently?" challenged Nathan. "How is it that Blakey has apparently turned into a block of concrete, and Weird Kid -" he snapped his picker in Simon's face. "- can turn invisible? It's not like this situation is backed up by a wank-load of logic, is it?"

Curtis just gave him the finger. So far, so normal...right?

* * *

Wrong. It was when we were in one of the car parks picking up the litter that things started to get a juuust little bit fucked up again. I picked up what looked like a rotting cucumber and stuffed it in my bag when Curtis suddenly exclaimed, "What is _that_?" His voice held a vague tone of disgust.

We looked in the direction he was gawping in. There, practically unconscious on the concrete, was a man. A naked man, to be exact. Of all the things that had happened over the last week, I think this held the contender of being the weirdest.

"Is he breathin'?" Kelly asked when we got closer to him.

"I…think so?" I said, craning my neck forward to double check. "Yup, he's breathing."

Alisha walked forward and tentatively poked the guy's arse with her picker. "Hey Nude Guy! You're naked!"

This seemed to wake the guy up. After stirring for a moment, he rolled over, apparently completely unaware of where he was. And as he rolled over, his legs reflexively opened, revealing to us – six very mentally disturbed twenty-somethings – his absolutely fucking _gigantic _knob.

And I really do mean gigantic. That thing looked like it could do a gal – or guy – some serious internal damage. It was like my fucking forearm!

We all let out varying noises of shocked disgust, though to be perfectly honest, I think the guys were slightly in awe of this man's, ahem, talent. From my position next to him, I didn't miss Simon take a picture of the dude's cock either. Yeah, just as I thought. Perverted.

However, as I looked at the screen and saw the man's face, I realised something. Why did that silver fox beard look so familiar…?

"OH MY GOD!" I yelled at the same time Nathan shouted out, "You!" It was Jeremy, his mum's boyfriend. The same Jeremy that she'd kicked Nathan out of the house for. No wonder Nate sounded so fucking angry.

Truth be told, I was currently desperately looking anywhere _except_ for at Jeremy's lower half. He looked at us, then down to his crotch, then back up to us. He scrambled to his feet and started running as fast as he could.

"Hey!" Nathan shouted after him, causing Jeremy to look back and trip over, quite literally almost going balls to the wall. We all burst into raucous laughter, as he jumped back to his feet and proceeded with the sprinting again, rounding a corner and disappearing from sight.

"You wanna tell us who that was?" Curtis laughed.

"He's my mum's…he lives with my mum!" said Nathan weakly.

"Your step-dad has got a massive cock!" announced Alisha, giggling.

"What?! No! Jesus!" cried Nathan as they all laughed. I kept my mouth shut as a sign of solidarity...even if I did find it fucking funny myself. "And he's not my step-dad, alright!"

"Did you see that thing? That was like monster big!" Alisha made a noise to indicate pain. "Your mum will hurt."

Nathan stuffed his fingers in his ears and chanted, "La la la la la!" before snapping, "Shut up!"

"Why's he naked?!" demanded Kelly, like we had a clue.

"An excellent question," I said. "Maybe he's one of them guys that gets off on flashing young, impressionable children. Has your mum had him checked, Nate? What if he's on the register?"

"He's obviously some kind of pervert," said Alisha. "Or he's gay."

"Yeah, that follows," said Curtis.

"What? He's cruising for rough trade!" said Alisha defensively. "They _love_ that shit!"

"Oh, a little light homophobia? Go for it!" Curtis gestured for her to follow Jeremy, an offer she quite obviously did not take up.

"He could be a rapist," Kelly said casually. "There's _loads_ of 'em round here."

"Cheers for that, Kelly. A nice thought for when we're all walking home on our own," I said sardonically.

"Maybe he's a werewolf," suggested Simon.

"Twat!" exclaimed Nathan, pointing at him with his litter-picker.

"It's what happens in films!" Simon defended. "You turn into a werewolf, you kill someone, then you wake up somewhere naked. Like a zoo."

"Isn't that more like _Twilight_?" I frowned.

"No," said Simon. "In _Twilight_ they aren't werewolves. They're shape-shifters." Consider me corrected.

"Look, he's not a werewolf!" said Nathan. "This guy's such a pussy, he needs my mum to open jars for him! I'm sure if he was a werewolf he'd be able to open a jar of peanut butter for himself!"

"Can confirm," I added, holding up my hand. "He asked me to open a bag of Wotsits once...he is not muscularly gifted in the bicep area."

"What if the storm messed him up?" Kelly piped up.

"That's bollocks," Nathan said, but he didn't sound so sure. "What're the chances?"

"Look around you, Nathan!" I said, gesturing around the group. "You're standing here with a boy who can turn invisible, a girl who can read minds, a boy who can turn back time, a girl who can make people want to shag her on contact, and a girl whose nerve endings don't exist! How can you not think there's a chance something happened to that guy?"

But Nathan shook his head, adamant. "No way. It would just be way too much of a coincidence."

* * *

A couple of hours later, we were back at the community centre, ready for the next half of our day. I froze as we walked into the main hall.

Oh my good God, they were everywhere. The room was dominated with them. They were eating, drinking, dancing. Old people. Now I'm no ageist, but when you're confronted with a hall full of people over sixty-five, you get a bit overwhelmed. Being forced into a line, I glanced at everyone in their casualwear. This is the first time we had been allowed to wear what we wanted, as opposed to those God-awful jumpsuits, and I genuinely started to think I might give one of the old dears a heart attack in my red and black striped shorts, cropped baseball shirt and, of course, my staple black Vans.

"Help out, talk to them, make sure everyone's having a good time," instructed Sally. We all hesitated, not really wanting to move into the throng of OAPs. "Move!" If this woman didn't top herself by the time she'd finished with us, it would be a miracle. Nathan, Kelly and I approached an old man in a wheelchair, who wasn't moving, had his eyes closed and was scarcely breathing.

"Is he dead?" asked Kelly, peering for a closer look. She whipped her head round to look at us, eyes wide. "I think he's dead!"

"They wouldn't just leave some dead guy around," I said nervously. "Would they?"

Nathan leaned in closer to the old man, putting his mouth next to the guy's ear. "SHE'S STEALING YOUR PENSION!" The old man jumped like he'd been shot, very much alive. Nathan turned to Kelly and me and grinned. "He's fine."

I sighed and headed to the dancefloor, where several of the old people were shuffling away to the music, pulling Nathan's hand as I did. "Come on, let's dance!"

"Have you ever noticed that minging smell old people give off?" Nathan asked me as we swayed in time to Gene Pitney's _24 Hours From Tulsa_; a very different vibe to Warehouse District, the nightclub in Wertham town centre that Nathan and I were known to frequent on Friday and Saturday nights.

"What, you mean the very distinct aroma of foist, mothballs and incoming death?" I snorted, letting out a laugh when he spun me out then pulled me back to his side, swinging us in a circle. "How could I not?"

I pulled away from him with a very Shakira-like hip wiggle, dissolving completely into a fit of giggles, though I hadn't missed Nathan's gaze never leaving me.

He opened his mouth to say something when a pale hand tapped him on the shoulder. Oh look, here was Sally, ready to sap any inkling of fun out of the situation. The woman was like a fucking black hole. Even her hair looked depressed, hanging there all limp and lifeless. Bitch.

"Nathan, Joan is asking for a nice strong young man to take her on a walk," she told him. "So I told her I knew the perfect candidate."

"Curtis?" I suggested irately, thoroughly pissed off that she'd seen fit to interrupt our dance.

"No, Blake, not Curtis," she sighed, glaring at me. She tugged on Nathan's arm. "Let's go."

"I'm busy," Nathan argued.

"You're right," Sally agreed sarcastically. "You _are_ busy. Busy with your community service."

"I'll catch up with you later," Nathan muttered to me as Sally quite literally dragged him towards a wrinkled old woman with thinning white hair perched in a wheelchair.

"Fucking bitch," I snarled after them. I turned on my heel and tried to stalk off in a dignified manner, but the illusion was shattered by a well-dressed elderly woman, who introduced herself as Christine, asking me to play a game of cards with her.

As much as I didn't want to, I accepted, trying to take my mind off how annoyed I was. I sat down with Christine and she produced a pack of cards, declaring she wished to play Go Fish. Halfway through the game, I was starting to get bored. I looked around the room, and saw Simon awkwardly dancing with some woman, Alisha was making tea and Kelly and Curtis were also dancing. Nathan was by the food table, talking to some really pretty blonde girl in a multicoloured sundress. As quick as a dagger to the chest, I felt a huge stab of jealousy rush through me, a silent snarl marring my lips.

Who was this girl? As I watched, they both began laughing together, and that violent, territorial feeling intensified. _No __Blake,__ stop it!_ I had no reason to be jealous. Nathan and I were best mates. Any other feelings were just...wrong. More than wrong. They were completely misplaced. If I was _ever_ stupid enough to even consider developing feelings for Nathan, then bigger fucking fool me. Nope. I would leave Little Miss Blondie to him. He'd only be looking to get his dick wet.

"Dumb whore," I mumbled under my breath. Apparently I hadn't been quite as quiet as I'd hoped as I didn't miss Christine giving me a reproachful look. I ignored her and looked back up at Nathan, who in the space of forty-five seconds had torn himself away from the blonde and was now dancing with an old woman in a yellow cardigan.

Christine followed my gaze and cracked a grin. "He's a nice one."

"He's alright," I said facetiously, rolling. "Not really my type."

"Oh please," scoffed Christine. "It's etched all over your face that you like the boy."

"Don't be gross, Christine," I replied casually, shuffling the cards in front of me. "Nathan and I have been best mates since we were like five. I physically cannot find him attractive, it would be incest at this point."

"Of course , my love. Whatever makes you feel better." Christine looked at Nathan again. "He is ever so good looking. If I were fifty years younger…"

"What say I get you a cup of tea, yeah?" I interrupted, standing up and hurrying over to the drinks table.

As I poured some milk into a cup, Nathan came up behind me. "Alright there, Blakey girl?"

"Right as rain, thanks very much," I muttered, stirring the cup of tea so ferociously I'm amazed I didn't crack the china. Instead, a load of the tea sloshed over the sides of the cup and splashed over my hand. I could see the skin rapidly turn red and a small little blister forming, but of course, I felt nothing. I was numb, like my soul. Now I was just wound up that I'd made a fucking mess. "Mother_fucker_!" I grabbed a handful of napkins and dabbed at the tea on my hand to dry off.

"Easy on the language there," said Nathan. "There are impressionable old people around!"

"Look, is there something you want, Nathan?" I snapped, turning around with my hands on my hips.

He blinked, very clearly put out by my attitude problem. "Who the fuck pissed on your sausage roll?"

I sighed, dragging a hand through my hair. There was no need for me to be acting like such a bitch. Nathan had sniffed around women like a dog in heat ever since we were fifteen and he got his first handjob from Carla Thomas behind the Sixth Form bike shed. This time was no different; of course it wasn't. "Sorry Nate...that time of the month."

"And that is information that will be enough to end this portion of our conversation," he grimaced. "Listen, don't suppose you have any...prophylactics on ya?"

Now it was my turn to blink. "Um, no, Nathan, I can't say I have. I've practically been a nun since Julian and I split, I've had precisely zero need for them."

"Shit," he groaned. "Gonna have to try and nick some from Superdrug."

"For fuck's sake, man, just buy some," I said exasperatedly.

"What the fuck is the point in buyin' condoms when I can't guarantee immediate use of them?" he argued.

"Oh yeah? So who's the lucky lady you plan on stealing condoms for? That pure-looking little blonde?"

"If you mean her -" he pointed to the girl I'd seen him talking to earlier. "Then yes. Beautiful, isn't she? Sure, she's not got much going for her in the vital areas – you know, tits and such - but she's so in to me it ain't even funny."

I mimed gagging. "She looks like a fucking Bible-basher. She will _never_ shag you, Nathan."

"'Course she will. I'm a fuckin' catch!"

I smiled wickedly. "Tell you what, let's make this more interesting, shall we?"

Nathan's interest was immediately piqued. "Go on."

"Let's have a little bet," I smirked. "If you can somehow get into her knickers by the end of the week – Friday, that is – then you get twenty quid. If you fail, you owe me the twenty."

Nathan chuckled. "Oh-ho, you underestimate me, Blakey. You're fuckin' on. I'll fuck her so many times before Friday that you'll owe me at least a hundred."

"Game on, fucker," I grinned, holding out my hand for me to shake as I tried to ignore the green-eyed monster that was desperately trying to envelop me.

* * *

"Seriously, what is it with old people and playing card games?" I grumbled in the locker room when we had finally been set free. "I'm tellin' ya, the next time someone asks me to play Snap with them, they are getting a slap!"

"You sound like you had fun," said Alisha, grinning.

"Is it obvious?" I said sarcastically, pulling my backpack out of my locker and closing it.

"Someone knows!" Curtis suddenly exclaimed out of nowhere. We all turned to face him, fear spreading through my veins. He was holding a piece of paper, an appalled expression marring his face. "They know we killed our probation worker!"

"What the fuck are you on about?" I demanded. In response, he held up the piece of paper so we could read it. On the sheet was a series of cliché ransom-note-style newspaper clippings spelling out I KNOW WHAT YOU DID.

"Is this a wind-up?" Kelly said, not sounding particularly bothered.

"Was this you?" I asked Nathan, who shut his locker indignantly and put his hands in his pockets. Let's be realistic, this was exactly the kind of prank his type of fucked-up sense of humour would pull.

"If I was tryin' to wind you up, I think I'd be a little more creative," he scoffed. He adopted a spooky, Vincent Price-esque tone of voice. "'_I know what film you saw last summer_.'"

"This isn't funny!" said Kelly angrily.

"If I wanted to freak you out, I'd've dug up the bodies and stuck those in your locker!" he exclaimed.

"If it wasn't him, who was it?" Simon asked fearfully.

"Well we've all done stuff," said Nathan intensely. "They could be talking about anything. Blake ran over a dog the day after she passed her driving test, they could be on about that."

"Oh fucking cheers, Nathan!" I yelped. "Wasn't like I was desperately trying to keep that memory suffocated or anything!"

"It was in _your_ locker!" Alisha pointed out to Curtis.

"This was meant for all of us!" he insisted. "They're talkin' about the probation worker!"

"You don't know that," I said fairly. "Seriously, it's probably just some prickhead dicking around with us! Who bothers with this kind of shit?"

"Yeah. Let's just say your right," said Nathan. "If they actually knew anything, they wouldn't be dickin' around sticking notes on lockers. They'd've gone to the police, and we'd all be banged up in prison gettin' gang-raped in the showers! But this -" he gestured at the note. "This means they have no evidence, no proof. Nothing. And anyway, I'm guessing it's about some other totally unrelated shit that you've done," he added to Curtis. "So, if we're all done here freakin' out over _nothing_, there's somewhere I need to be." He patted Curtis patronizingly on the shoulder and sauntered out of the locker room.

There were a few seconds of an intense silence as we all looked at each other, wondering if Nathan could be right for a change.

"Please tell me you don't actually believe that prick!" exploded Curtis.

"Fuck off, Curtis!" I said heatedly. "That 'prick' is my best mate! Stop being a fucking drama queen for once and chill out! This ain't proof! It's a fucking piece of paper in a locker! It's bullshit!"

"Whoever did it's just tryin' to freak us out, right?" said Kelly, getting wound up. "So just act normal!"

"Good idea," I agreed, a smidge calmer. "I mean, come on. What's to worry about? The probation worker's six feet under, there's nothing to panic about. Give it a week, and him and Gary will need dental records to be identified. We are fine." Famous last words.

* * *

**A/N- Again, I just really want to apologise for the lack of updates recently. I'm hoping I'll be getting back in the swing of things and be able to update chapter 5 faster, but just bear with me. I promise I'm getting there. Please review, they always give me that extra burst of motivation to keep going. Love to you all. Xx Gee xX**


	5. Puppy Love

**A/N – Many thanks to Alessandra12 and xdiexromanticx for reviewing!**

* * *

**Chapter Five – Puppy Love**

Urgh. Tuesdays. I hated the things. No, it was nothing to do with the prison-like sentence I currently found myself in. Tuesdays were therapy days. Let me rewind a bit.

* * *

_**Saturday 6th December 2008  
**__**Wertham Wolves Rugby Club Christmas Party**_

"_Babe! Smile, it's a party! You're supposed to be happy!" _

_Julian just grunted at me. He'd been playing for Wertham Wolves for the entire two and a half years we'd been together, not to mention a few seasons before that too. He was their inside centre, number 12, built like a brick shithouse and the Wolves' star player. He'd scored more tries in the last two seasons than most guys on the team scored in their whole career. Because of him, the Wolves were a mere division behind the Premiership._

_We were dressed to the nines; him in a sleek black tuxedo, me in a black minidress with clear chiffon sleeves and cold shoulders. Tonight was supposed to be about him; he was 2008's Player of the Year. But he couldn't even crack a smile. We'd been sitting around a table for four with his 13, Luke, and his girlfriend, Mercedes, for the last two hours. They'd hit the dancefloor a long time ago, though._

"_This is getting ridiculous," I grumbled, pulling out my phone and tapping out a text._

_**You and gang out 2nite? Reckon I might be done here by 10.**_

**What? Thought u and the boyf were at the Neanderthal Oscars.**

_**Funny. We are and he's being a moody prick.**_

**Always said he was a little bitch.**

_**Not helpful. I'll let you know what's going on in a bit.**_

"_Who're you texting?" It was the first time Julian had spoken to me in almost twenty minutes._

"_And he speaks," I said coolly, stashing my phone into my handbag._

"_Don't be smart with me, Blake," he snapped. "Who. Are. You. Texting?"_

"_Nathan. That okay?" I retorted. His scowl deepened. "Julian, what is wrong with you tonight?"_

"_You know I don't like you talking to him when you're with me."_

"_Jules. Baby, please don't start that again," I said with a sigh, placing my hand on his bicep with a small squeeze. "Nate and I will only ever be friends. I told you when we got together that he'd always be a part of my life."_

"_I don't like how he looks at you," he sulked._

"_I don't like how half the girls in town look at you when you walk off the pitch all sweaty and glistening," I pointed out. "But I've learned to accept it."_

"_That's different," he tried to argue._

"_It wasn't that different when you slept with Katie Prince last month," I muttered; out of the corner of my eye, I saw Julian's fist clench. I was pushing it with that one, I knew I was. Julian had vehemently denied having any involvement with Katie, but the video his teammate Roman had sent me from that night of my boyfriend up against a wall jack-hammering her into oblivion said otherwise. I mean, the video was of the back of his head, but I knew those dark blonde curls anywhere._

"_I told you, I never touched that skanky slag," he spat._

"_Methinks the gentleman doth protest too much," I said with a roll of the eyes._

"_Okay, listen here, you ungrateful-" Julian had began to rise out of his seat; instinctively I flinched back, expecting some form of strike. None came. Thankfully, the Wolves' head coach – David Warren – had taken to the mic on the bandstand and announced, "Ladies and gentlemen, if I could have your attention; it is time to announce the winners of the 2008 Wertham Wolves End of Year Awards."_

_Just to help me breathe a deeper sigh of relief, Luke and Mercedes sat back down with us, forcing Julian and I to turn our chairs around the face the bandstand. We were sat for twenty minutes listening to the speeches of the winners; Forward of the Year, Back of the Year, Top Points Scorer of the Year, Try of the Year, Dick of the Year, as many rugby-related awards as you could think of. I clapped, cheered, laughed as much as I could, but deep down, my stomach was churning. That look in Julian's eye when he'd started to shout...I knew that look. He didn't let that look go. And now, though his hand was on my knee, there was nothing loving about it; it was possessive, his fingertips biting into my skin. My other leg was restless, jiggling up and down in its red high heel. God, I was scared. Two hours ago, I'd have given anything to leave here. Now I knew that leaving meant being alone with him, and that was when he terrified me the most._

"_And now, the award everyone has been waiting for," David declared, and everyone in the room began a makeshift drumroll on the tabletops with their hands. "This young man, at the age of twenty-five, has turned Wertham Wolves into the town's biggest sporting success almost singlehandedly. Despite calls from Gloucester, London Irish and even Premiership table-toppers, the Leicester Tigers, his loyalty to his team and his town has never wavered. Ladies and gentlemen, it gives me great pleasure to announce that the Wertham Wolves' 2008 Overall Player of the Year is...Julian Quinn!" _

_The room erupted. Whistles, cheers, cat-calls, stamping feet, the sounds of it all echoed off the walls as Julian sauntered his way through the throngs of his teammates, partners, coaches. He was patting shoulders and shaking hands the whole way up there, finally going up the few steps to the bandstand. Grinning ear to ear, he accepted the plaque David handed to him and turned to the mic. His speech oozed charisma; he'd always had the gift of the gab, always knew exactly what to say and exactly when to say it. It was one of the many reasons I'd agreed to go out with him when he asked. He was cracking jokes, subtly sucking up to the right people and thanking everyone in his family._

"_And of course," his near-ten minute speech concluded. "I wouldn't even be making this speech if it hadn't been for the constant support of my darling, beautiful girlfriend, Blake." All eyes in the room turned to me, and I felt my face burn scarlet. "Baby, for almost three seasons you've pushed me to be the best guy on the field. You've been there for me after training, helped nurse me back after all those injuries last season, hell, you've sometimes been the only girl left on the bench if its been pissing it down on game day. I love you, and this-" He held up his plaque. "-this is your award too. So friends and family of the club, I ask you to raise a toast to my gorgeous girl, Miss Blake Harper!"_

"_To Blake!" Every voice in the clubhouse echoed my name as glasses of cheap champagne were raised up. I could barely force a smile; how was he so good at this? He could play the perfect boyfriend whenever he wanted...whenever we were around other people._

_Behind closed doors, just me and him, there was no 'gorgeous girl,' no champagne, no awards. It was twisted wrists, bruises covered up by jeans and long sleeves, spiteful words that stuck to me like glue. A grazed knee here, a black eye there. How had it taken me till tonight to realise how wrong this was? Julian didn't love me, not like I thought I loved him. I was about as important as that plaque in his hands; I was a trophy girlfriend, something to show off, something that didn't talk back. I wasn't that girl anymore._

_It happened in a blur._

_I stumbled up from my seat, right in the middle of everyone still applauding Julian coming off stage. I saw him look at me but my vision was fuzzy as I seized my clutch bag from the table and fucking belted it out of the room and out of the clubhouse completely._

_**Meet me at mine in 15. I'm doing a runner. **_

_Somehow I managed to type out a coherent text message to Nathan as I fled, my fingers flying over the keys. I had never been more grateful that I'd agreed to be the designated driver tonight. Sure, as I scrambled for my car keys, I realised I'd be leaving Luke and Mercy stranded here but to be honest, that was sort of the least of my concerns. I was just about to jam my key into the door to unlock it when a ping from my phone caught my attention._

**What did that fucker do 2 u? U know what, never mind. I'll c u at yours in a bit.**

_Nathan could be useless at the best of times, but at moments like this, he was the best friend anyone could ever ask for. I finally wrenched the door open and tossed both my phone and clutch bag into the passenger seat. But before I could actually get into the car myself…_

"_Going somewhere, bumblebee?" Julian's deep voice came from my left and his hand appeared from nowhere and slammed my door shut as I let out a scream. "What the fuck do you think you're doing, Blake?"_

"_Get away from me, Julian," I demanded through gritted teeth. "I'm not doing this here."_

"_Doing what, Princess?" he taunted, but his voice was dangerously low. "Come back inside, we'll get you a little glass of something and you can calm the fuck down."_

"_Stay. Away. From. Me," I repeated. "I'm not going back in there just to listen to you spout more bullshit about how much you supposedly 'love me.'"_

"_I do love you," he insisted, trying to place his hand on my cheek but I flinched back._

"_You're full of shit!" I screamed, past caring about the congregation of people who had gathered at the door of the clubhouse to watch this little soap opera unfold._

"_Stop embarrassing me, you stupid bitch," he hissed._

"_Don't worry, I wouldn't want to spoil your special night," I spat out sardonically, flinging my car door open for a second time. "I'm fuckin' out of here."_

"_You leave now and you're gonna regret it, Princess," Julian warned me, his eyes full of anger._

"_I'm sure I'll live with it. We're done, Quinn," I retorted, and just to add insult to injury, I spat in his face before jumping into the driving seat of the Polo and nope-ing the fuck out of there._

_Nathan was waiting at the door of my ground floor flat when I pulled up fifteen minutes later, tears streaming down my face. "What the fu- Blakey?" He ran up to me, and instead of his usual unbothered-by-anything expression, he looked panicked. "What the fuck did he do to you?!"_

"_N-nothing," I sniffed, unlocking the front door and going inside, kicking my shoes off and immediately going to the kitchenette to pour myself a VERY large neat Jack Daniels._

"_Nothing my arse," Nathan said, following me inside and opening my fridge to help himself to a can of Coke. "I've known you fuckin' sixteen years and you've only ever cried because of that arsehole you call a boyfriend."_

"_He's not my boyfriend anymore," I mumbled, chugging that JD so quickly it burned my oesophagus and made me cough. I dropped my head and braced my hands against the worktop, my hair falling down around my face. Don't cry...do not cry again..._

"_Shit," Nathan sighed, leaning against the worktop too. "I mean, not exactly gonna pretend I'm not happy you finally told that prick where to stick it, but..." His hand came up and rested on my shoulder. "You okay, Blakey?"_

_I shrugged, turning to face him. "I don't know. I don't care right now, either." I stood up straight and scrubbed a hand down my face, wiping the tears and makeup streaks from my cheeks. "We're going back out. Give me a few to get ready."_

"_You sure?" Nathan looked slightly startled. "Like, I'm all for drownin' your sorrows but you don't really look like you should be goin' anywhere near a club tonight."_

"_You're not my mum, so don't fucking act like it," I snapped at him, turning around and stalking over to where my bed and dresser were._

"_You scare me sometimes," I heard him mutter, but he left me alone and plonked himself down on the sofa anyway. My crying finally completely subsided, I reached for a makeup wipe from the top of my dresser, moved to the mirror and scrubbed every last trace of what was left of my 'formal' makeup look. Face clear a minute later, I stripped off that stupid dress and opened my jeans drawer when there was a sudden loud thumping at my front door._

"_Who the fuck is that, the Incredible fuckin' Hulk?" Nathan spluttered, leaping up from the sofa as I peeped my head around the half-wall, frowning at him._

"_I don't kn-" I started to say when my front door suddenly flew open, revealing an absolutely furious Julian. I let out a scream of fear as he stormed across the flat, seized hold of me by the throat and slammed me up against the wall. Now only clad in my underwear, my bare back scraped against the painted brick. "GET OFF!"_

"_SHUT THE FUCK UP!" he bellowed, his hand tightening._

"_Get the fuck off her, you 'roided-up fucknut!" Nathan yelled at him, trying to wrench Julian's hand off me, but all Julian did was laugh at him, lift his other hand and slam it into Nathan's chest, winding him as he fell to the floor with an almost comical 'Oof!' sound._

"_J-Julian," I choked out, scrabbling my hand at his fingers. "P-please..."_

"_P-please! P-please!" he mimicked with a sick laugh. "Not such a tough bitch now, are you, bumblebee? Thought it was a good idea, didn't you? Embarrassing me in front of all those people at the club? Dumping me in public? On MY night?" His fingers tightened again as he said 'my.' _

_I gasped out for a breath, my vision slowly blurring as the oxygen was slowly cut off from my brain, but I barely sucked in anything. Nathan was still trying to gather his own breath on the floor from Julian's handoff; he couldn't help even if he tried._

_Julian laughed again. "I told you you'd regret leaving me there tonight. I swear to God, Princess, if I don't kill you and your little fuckboy tonight, you'll fuckin' wish that I had."_

"_Police! My mate's ex has gone fuckin' psycho!" I suddenly heard Nathan yelp. Julian turned his head sharply, keeping me pinned to the wall and I managed to see out of the corner of my eye Nathan clutching my landline. He'd moved so silently neither of us had even noticed. Without breaking eye contact with Julian, he shouted my address at the operator followed by, "He's fuckin' chokin' her! Fuck it, send an ambulance too! He's mental!" He hung up the phone and spat out, "Your number's up, you abusive twat!"_

"_You fuckin-" Julian started to say, but taking the opportunity as he was distracted, I used the last of my strength to bring my knee up and nail him straight in the balls. He let out a howl like a deranged wolf and released his grip on my throat. Both of us fell to the ground, Julian clutching at his crown jewels and me trying to suck in as much oxygen as I could, choking and spluttering, unattractive globs of spit flying out of my mouth. _

"_C'mon Blake, we're getting outta here," Nathan grunted, slipping his hands under my arms and hauling me to my feet, looping one of my arm's over his shoulder and practically dragging me across the flat since I was still finding it difficult to stand, let alone walk or run. We didn't get very far._

"_BITCH!" Julian screamed, grabbing hold of my bare ankle and tripping me over, my arm accidentally catching Nathan's knee and causing him to fall and knock his head on the floor._

"_No! No, Julian, let me go!" I shrieked, struggling as he clambered on top of me to pin me down._

"_You brought this on yourself, bumblebee," he declared almost manically._

_It all happened so quickly. Julian had me pinned by the throat again, his sixteen stone frame of pure muscle also keeping me held down. His other arm raised, hand clenched in a fist. I opened my mouth to let out yet another scream, but it never came. Julian's fist came down and I screwed my eyes shut. What happened next was nothing but pain._

_Julian's fist connected with my face and it felt like my entire head exploded with white hot agony. Oh my God, it was awful. I had never felt pain like this in my entire life. Blood filled my mouth and it felt like my teeth were misaligned. I wasn't stupid; I knew that fucking sociopath had broken my jaw._

_I wanted to scream but I couldn't because I didn't know what more damage could be caused if I opened my mouth. I instead let out a closed mouth wail as Julian just sat above me, laughing bitterly. I began to silently cry, the suppressed sobs convulsing my body. I could even feel the blood in my mouth begin trickling from the corners of my lips._

"_YOU MOTHERFUCKER!" Nathan suddenly roared, throwing himself at Julian and tackling him clean off me. The two of them began one hell of a fist-fight as I dragged myself away from them, cradling my swelling face in a hand, ignoring the stickiness of my own blood under my fingertips. All I could do was sob and sob, regretting ever getting involved with a psychopath like Julian Quinn, exactly like he said I would._

* * *

The police had arrived not long after the boys had started their fight, tearing them away from each other and slapping Julian in cuffs and taking him and Nathan to Wertham PD while I was taken away in an ambulance, the pain so bad I was slipping in and out of consciousness.

Unsurprisingly, an x-ray concluded that my jaw was indeed broken, so misaligned that I required a small surgery to sort it out and was fitted with a jaw wire to keep my mouth shut and allow the bone to reset. I was dosed up with a load of painkillers and was instructed to keep to a liquid diet until I was healed. It took six weeks to heal completely. I moved back in with my parents' for a little while just so I could even begin to function again. My Christmas dinner was blended up for me and eaten through a straw. I spent my first ever New Year's Eve sober at home, sobbing on the sofa.

Somewhere in those six weeks, Julian was found guilty of actual bodily harm and ordered to pay a £250 fine with a suspended three month prison sentence and a five game ban. The judge didn't want to impair the rugby team as they were a, quote unquote, asset and pride to the community. He was also ordered to stay at least fifty feet away from me for those three months. That was it. Three months suspended, a month without rugby and a pathetically small restraining order for breaking my face.

Myself, on the other hand...I was ruined. I became scared of crowds, shook at loud noises and barely left the house. I didn't speak. I couldn't sleep. By the time my wire was removed, I had lost well over a stone and a half, dropping from just over ten stone to barely clearing eight. I was sickly white, gaunt, dead hair hanging limply, ribs and collarbones sticking out all over the gaff. I looked like some kind of fucking demon child.

I was hopeless. I was lost. There was no point anymore. I hadn't seen any of my friends in forever, fuck, even Nathan only dropped in once or twice a week. I was holding them all back, I knew I was. Including Mum and Dad. They had Ella and Alfie to look after, they didn't need me hanging around still when I could have gone back to my flat weeks ago. I was a burden on everyone. It would be easier if I was just...gone.

Of course, it didn't quite work out that way. Dad came home from work early and found me bleeding out on the bathroom floor, one of his razor blades limply hanging from my fingertips. For the second time in as many months I found myself strapped up in the back of an ambulance zooming to Wertham General.

After I was stitched up and monitored for the night, I ended up getting sectioned under the Mental Health Act of 1983. It was for my own good, and I didn't put up a fight. I needed help, I knew that.

After that came the many talks with therapists and psychiatrists, then the diagnoses. Depression. Anxiety. PTSD. A nice little cocktail of mental issues that I'm still dealing with today. I was put on medication to help cope, and during my two week stay at the hospital I was able to talk through everything that was causing my head to be so darkly clouded.

I've put weight back on to look a lot healthier. I respond better to crowds and loud noises, I sleep through the nights most days. I'm pretty much back to the same gobby, sparky, bitchy gal I was before Julian tore apart my psyche. But I'm still plagued by those thoughts sometimes, I'm still on the same medication I was when I left hospital. As a result, I'm required to attend hour-long therapy sessions every Tuesday. It was only going to be for three months but got extended by the courts to the end of my community service as they thought it would help with my supposed temper. A pile of bullshit, I thought, but I was hardly gonna argue. I used to go to the hospital for my chats, but now my therapist – Nancy, the same woman I'd been with all year – had to come to the shithole community centre.

"Come on, Blake. We're wasting time, sweetheart. Talk to me. How are you feeling today?" Nancy asked me today, half an hour into our near-silent session, away from prying ears in the safety of the probation office.

_Scared. Jealous. __Confused__._ "Fine." I was in a particularly narky mood today, lounging back and giving her one word answers. Between the note in Curtis' locker and struggling to comprehend that outburst of green-eyed monster during our OAPsitting, my head was fried and I really could not be bothered with this.

"Have you had any contact with your family since our meeting last week?"

"Yeah."

"Have you experienced any of your dark moods at all?"

"Kind of."

Nancy sighed. "Blake, come on, you know better than this. I'm going to need more than monosyllabic answers if I'm going to properly assess you."

I mimicked her sigh. "Nancy, come on, you know _me_ better than this. If I had something to talk about, I'd talk about it. Cut me a little slack."

"Let's not play this game, Blake," she said, peering at me over her reading glasses. "I think you forget how well I've gotten to know you over this year. I know when something is on your mind. Let it out. This is a safe space."

I huffed out a second sigh. "I don't know what you want me to say. Genuinely, in the grand scheme of things, I feel _fine_. I had what could be described as a...minor existential crisis last week but I talked it through with Nathan and he calmed me down."

"This is a good start, Blake, well done!" Nancy encouraged, scribbling notes down in her notebook. "I know that given the circumstances, nothing about community service could be considered 'good' but if we're looking on the bright side, I'm glad you're going through this with Nathan. He's been a good friend to you throughout your recent turmoils."

I nodded. "Wouldn't be here without him or my Dad, that's for sure."

"I'm glad you've brought up your dad. You mentioned you've spoken to your family in the last week, tell me about that."

I smiled; talking about my family always cheered me up nicely. "I went round for lunch last Saturday. Ella's A1 Drama performance is next week and she wanted to run lines with me so I ended up being there until like gone seven. Mum made her famous Quiche Lorraine and coleslaw, it was great. It was like all the other shit of the last week didn't matter."

Nancy frowned. "You haven't mentioned anything 'shit' recently, Blake. What do you mean?"

Ohh fuck. Foot-In-Mouth Harper does it again. "Er...I...Um...I," I stuttered, scrambling my brain for an excuse. "I-I just mean in general! Like it's not exactly fun being stuck in this hell-hole every fucking day, you know?"

"I can only begin to imagine," she replied. "Well now you're in a slightly better mood, today I thought we could talk about..."

* * *

The rest of the session went well, I chilled out a bit and allowed Nancy to do her job. I wasn't happy about it but I didn't need to take it out on the poor woman, this was what she was paid to do. Saying goodbye and being reminded that if I had any issues before next week's session to call her, I vacated the probation office and was immediately greeted by the sight of Nathan brandishing his mobile at anyone who would pay attention and frantically gesturing at the screen. Oh Jesus, now what?!

"Blake! Hey! HEY!" he called over the second he clocked that I was free. "Blakey! C'mere!"

"Nathan, it's barely even ten AM," I groaned as he sprinted over. "Whatever mentalness this is, can't it wait?"

"No it can fucking not," he retorted. "Jeremy, that nudist paedophile freak, he was out again last night!" He jabbed his phone at my face, screen displaying a barely discernable photo taken in night-vision.

"Okay, first of all, at no point has there _ever_ been a suggestion that Jezza is a kiddy-fiddler," I reminded him, squinting at the phone. "Second of all...what exactly am I supposed to be looking at here, Nate?"

He sighed. "Cock, anus, ball sack!" He pointed each of them out.

"What the fuck is that?" I exclaimed, pointing to one part of the photo.

"That's anus! Fuckin' hell, don't you people get that it's from a low angle?!"

"Where did you get this? Where were you last night?" I said quizzically, looking at him.

"Er, nowhere," he said quickly, before hurrying over to Simon. "Look! Cock, anus, ball sack?! Yeah?"

Simon grinned sheepishly. "What's that?"

"That's cock!" Nathan looked around at us all. "Look, this guy is livin' with my mum, we've gotta do somethin'!"

"Like what?" said Kelly, unstacking a few chairs.

"Can you get me a gun?" asked Nathan, totally seriously.

"I ain't gettin' ya a gun," she said quiet simply.

"Come on, you know someone right?" he persisted. "Just a little one. Nothin' too leery."

"There's no way I'm gettin' a dick'ead, like you, a gun!" she said with an air of finality.

"Nathan, you can't even fire a BB gun without screaming, how in the fuck do you expect to be able to use a pistol or some shit?" I demanded.

"Unimportant," he retorted flippantly.

"You can get a gun off the internet," interjected Simon, who was filming us again.

"Right, what if we go around there tonight," said Nathan. "And we'll talk to him, we'll be mature, and polite, yeah? And then we'll just tell him to fuck off."

"What if he says no?" said Kelly.

"Yeah, he might be a 'lil bitch but I doubt he'll take too kindly to you just turning up and telling him to fuck off," I said, folding my arms.

"I dunno, we'll improvise," Nathan said with a dismissive wave of his hand before throwing out his arms. "So who's with me?"

There was an uncomfortable silence as Simon, Kelly, Alisha, Curtis and I all looked at each other.

"Oh, it's like that is it?" Nathan sounded offended. "So much for bein' united by a horrific, life-changin', shared experience." We all looked at him blankly. "You know. Last week? The _situation_?" More blank looks. "We killed our probation worker?!" he practically shouted.

"Shut up!" I hissed, followed by "Prick!" from Curtis and "You're such a dick'ead!" from Kelly.

"That counts for nothing?" concluded Nathan, apparently not troubled by the fact he'd nearly sold us out to anyone who could have been listening. He turned to me, eyes wide and pleading. "Blakey? Come on, it's always been you and me, right? Sherlock and Watson and all that bullshit? Could really do with my Sherlock now."

I sighed. Bloody guilt-tripping knobhead. "Goddamn it. Yeah, alright, I'll come with you."

"I'll come as well," Simon suddenly offered. "You know, if you want someone to go with you. I'll come."

Nathan looked at him scornfully. "I'm not being funny, but me and you-" he gestured between the two of them. "Buddying up? Kickin' ass? I'm just not feelin' it, but hey. Lovely thought. Cheers. Nope, me and Blakey here -" he threw his arm around my shoulders. "- have it all under control."

I smiled sympathetically at Simon to show him I was sorry for Nathan being such a tit to him before shrugging Nathan's arm from around me and helping Kelly set out the chairs. The door slammed, and I turned in time to see Simon disappear into the locker room. So it was going to be another one of those days, was it?

* * *

The rest of the day seemed to just drag on and on, but eventually it was _finally _time to go home. Kelly, Alisha and I headed to the locker room to get changed. Nathan and Curtis had already sorted themselves out with Nathan now waiting outside the locker room for me and him to go to see good ol' Jezza. As for Simon...no one had seen him since Nathan had pissed him off.

"I'm probably gonna end up getting called up by the police again," said Alisha as we all opened our lockers. "For breaking my curfew." Urrrgggh, whyyyy did she think any of us gave a fuck about her 'ooh look at me, I'm such a bad girl' bullshit persona?

"Why?" said Kelly. Why. Why did she have to bite? Now I'd have to listen to yet another monologue about Alisha's SUPER COOL nightlife.

"I went out last night," said Alisha, unzipping her jumpsuit.

"'Who with?"

_KELLY. STOP ASKING QUESTIONS! _I thought at her, and she frowned at me for a second.

"Some mates."

"Who were they?" Kel pressed on. Why did I even bother.

"Just some mates," replied Alisha, slightly frostier than needed. "You don't know 'em."

Kelly stripped off her own jumpsuit and bent over to get something out of her locker. Alisha and I both noticed the bow tattoo at the base of her spine at the same time.

"Did that hurt when you got it done?" Alisha asked her.

"Yeah, it hurt like a bastard," she answered, twisting her head round to look at it.

"Really?" My eyebrows shot so far up my head they practically disappeared into my hairline. I held out both my wrists, left wrist decorated with the bird sitting on my scar like a branch, right wrist sporting a howling Indian wolf made of swirling lines. "I barely felt these and the wrist is supposed to be the most painful place to get tatted."

Kelly shrugged. "I only got it done 'cause me fiancé wanted it."

"Are you _engaged_?" Alisha and I questioned simultaneously, as surprised as each other.

"I was. Not any more," she replied, tugging a purple polo shirt over her head.

"Why? What happened?" I asked, pulling on my standard pair of ripped black skinnies and stepping back into my navy Converse.

"I could hear what he was thinkin', yeah?" said Kelly. "And he weren't exactly bein' romantic."

"That is beyond shit," I said benevolently, pulling my yellow bra strap back onto my shoulder as it had been slipping down.

"S'alright," Kelly shrugged. "He was a bit of a dick, anyway." _Guess we've got some common ground on shit exes_, I thought, and Kelly gave me a small smile before she turned to look at Alisha. "Have you been with anyone since you could do your thing?"

"No, not full on," she answered nonchalantly, yanking a pink leopard-print dress up her torso. Definitely not a walk of shame look at all. "I tried it out with a couple of guys, just for a second. They were proper horny. One was quite fit, actually," she added.

"Should have gone for it," I said in a falsely bright, _very _sarcastic tone, tugging a black Bring Me The Horizon tee over my head and spraying on some Impulse Tease. Cue classic Alisha glare.

"Have ya shagged anyone?" Kelly asked her.

"What d'you think?" Alisha sighed, adjusting her dress. Then, out of nowhere, I got the weirdest feeling. You know when every hair on your body stands on end and you have the urge to get really defensive? It was like that. I was sure I was being watched by something that shouldn't be there. I'd even convinced myself I felt a breath against my shoulder.

"Urgh," I shivered, giving a small, involuntary shake.

"What's up with you?" Alisha frowned.

I turned around to where it felt like the breath had come from, but there was nothing. Nobody there. "Nothing. I just had a twitchy moment. That's all."

"Right," she said in a tone that suggested the second word of that sentence was 'freak,' closing her locker. "Come on, let's go." Kelly and I both swung our lockers shut and followed her out.

"Christ, how long does it take for girls to change?" whined Nathan the second I stepped out the door.

"Do not start with me, Nathan," I warned him, holding up my hand. "Can we just get this over with? And _no_!" I snapped as he opened his mouth again. "We're not stopping to get a gun!"

He closed his mouth again...then opened it again two seconds later. "Fine. Come on then, Blakey gal. Let's fuck shit up!"

* * *

Of course I ended up driving. The Polo may as well have been the Batmobile in Nathan's eyes. It was like he didn't realise that bright blue did not blend into the suburban houses of where he grew up. There were two cars parked up in the drive so I pulled up the other side of the road and a house length back to keep hidden.

"Right, slight problem," Nathan awkwardly said as we approached the house, whirling round to face me. "I still don't actually have a key."

I heavily facepalmed. "Shit, I completely forgot, and it's not like my botched spare will work in the new lock. Fuck! This was your idea, so what do you suggest?! Breaking in through one of the windows?"

Nathan's face lit up. "That's a pretty damn good idea, Blakey! Who knew that crazy 'lil brain of yours could work so well?" Before I even had a chance to tell him I was joking, he started creeping along the side of the house, crouching under the windows and keeping himself pressed up against the bricks.

I crawled up beside him as he peered through the kitchen window, which was open slightly. "This is fucking ridiculous," I grumbled. "What are we, fucking _MI High _rejects?"

"Will you shut up?" Nathan hissed, easing the window open wide enough for us to climb through. "We need to be stealthy. We need to be fuckin' ninjas!"

"Oh yeah, good idea asking me to come along then! I'm like, the clumsiest person ever!" I exclaimed through my teeth.

"Be quiet! Jesus!" he shushed, putting his finger over my lips. He motioned for me to go. "Ladies first."

"Prick," I muttered, hoisting myself through the window. There were some dishes on the draining board, but luckily I saw them before kicking them over. I hopped down from the worktop and waved Nathan in. I could hear some weirdo tinkly pop music playing, and a whirring noise.

Nathan put his hand on the windowsill and heaved. He pulled himself in halfway, then held his arms out to me. "A little help, Blakey?"

"Oh, fucking hell," I mumbled, taking hold of his wrists and pulling him so that he was on the draining board. His elbow jerked out and sent one of the plates tumbling to the ground, breaking with a smash. "Shit, Nathan! Look out!"

"I'm tryin'!" he hissed. However, he evidently wasn't trying hard enough as he flailed around, sending another two plates to their doom and falling to the floor himself.

In the midst of this complete bloody chaos, Jeremy had appeared through one of the doors to the kitchen, dressed in cycling shorts and a sweaty t-shirt. His face was marred with a frown. "Nathan?"

Nathan scrambled to his feet. "That's right," he said, trying to sound intimidating...and failing. Miserably. "Your number's up, you psycho nudist freak!"

"Seriously?" I said, facepalming for a second time. "All the insults you could have used in this Godforsaken world, and you go for that? Good God."

Jeremy squinted at me. "Blake? Good to see you, sweetheart."

"Um...yeah. Sure. How ya doing, Jez?" I said awkwardly, scratching the back of my neck.

"Okay, great, we all know each other, everyone's great! But you! I've got you now!" Nathan snapped, brandishing his mobile at Jeremy. "See anything you recognise?"

Jeremy cocked his head slightly to the side, trying to comprehend the picture of his own backside. "What am I looking at?"

"Cock, anus, ball sack?" Nathan said frustratedly, pointing to each part of the picture.

"Is it?"

"It's from a low angle," I said helpfully.

"It's you!" said Nathan, ignoring my comment. "Last night! George Michael gets away with this shit but he used to be in WHAM!. Who're you?"

"George Michael? You've gone for that? Really? Oh my God," I muttered.

Nathan glared at me. "Will you stop with the interruptin'?" he said, incensed, before turning back to Jeremy. "So?"

"I don't remember what happened," Jeremy admitted.

"Oh, how very convenient," Nathan said derisively, holding up the phone. "_This_ happened! I show this to my mum, you're history. So just-" he picked up a radio that was playing the weirdo tinkly pop music. "-take your crappy shit, and go." He dropped the radio. It hit the tiled flooring with a crack and split down the side, the music puttering out and the battery falling out.

"That's your mum's," Jeremy informed him, and I had to seriously bite my tongue to stop myself bursting out laughing. This was getting so ridiculous I was actually quite glad I'd made the effort to tag along.

Well then I'll buy her a new one, because that's what sons do for their mums!" Nathan said, undeterred. "Look, don't make this any harder on her, just _go_!"

"No, _you_ g-go," Jeremy stuttered. "Your mum doesn't even want you here."

"You prick!" Nathan clenched his fist and punched Jeremy full in the face.

"Nathan, no!" I cried, grabbing his hand in both of mine. His skin was so hot, I'd only ever seen him this angry one other time...the night that broke me. The sound of the ruckus could probably be heard at the other end of the bloody street, so it really was no surprise that Louise suddenly appeared in the kitchen as well, looking completely aghast.

"Nathan!" she gasped. "What are you doing?!"

"You made me do this!" Nathan insisted, jerking his hand from mine and pointing at Jeremy. "You wouldn't listen! That psycho was out there again last night," he added to his mum. "Tell her, you sick bastard!"

"He already told me!" she shouted, handing Jeremy a wodge of tissues for his now-bleeding nose.

"WHAT?!" Nathan and I yelped in unison.

"He told you?" Nathan repeated incredulously. "So…_what the fuck_?!"

"It started after that storm," Jeremy said, taking my advice and leaning forward slightly. "It did something to me. Sometimes it's like I'm a dog. When I was a kid, we had this Jack Russell, Billy. We did everything together."

_After t__he storm? __Oh my God, it really__ it wasn't just us who was effected!_ is something I so very nearly said out loud. Thankfully I managed to suck this one in; no need to nearly land myself in it twice in one day.

"That's weird!" Nathan whispered to his mum, who was getting more tissues. "That's really weird!"

"He was my best friend. Now whenever I see a Jack Russell, it…it brings back all these feelings, and the next thing I know I'm waking up…naked."

"It's true," confirmed Nathan's mum. "I didn't believe it at first, but I've seen what he's like when he changes."

Nathan looked like he was about to be sick. "Just…are you honestly telling me that you're okay with this?!"

"If that's who he is," she said solemnly. "I've got to accept it. I mean, some men dress up in women's clothing!"

"Yeah, they're just sick perverts!" Nathan persisted. He gestured at Jeremy. "He's dangerous!"

Jeremy stood up quickly and stood behind Nathan's mum. "I would never hurt your mum! I love her." He and Nathan's mum shared an adoring look between them.

"Awww!" I said, actually finding the declaration rather sweet. I was rewarded with three separate WTF looks. "Sorry."

Nathan's mum had a closer look at Jeremy's face. "You've broken his nose!"

Nathan rolled his eyes. "Urgh, it's not like you can enter him in Crufts!"

I honestly think the only person more surprised about what happened next than me was Nathan himself. Louise's hand flew out and connected with her son's cheek with a harsh cracking noise. I gasped, she gasped. Hell, we all gasped. Nathan looked at his mum in incredulity, clutching the side of his face that she'd slapped. There was a pregnant pause before he turned and bolted out of the back door.

"Oh shit," I muttered, dashing after him, leaving his mum and Jeremy in the kitchen. "Nathan!" I yelled after him. "Nathan!" He was halfway down the road when I caught up with him, his hands stuffed moodily in the pockets of his hoodie. "Nathan, for God's sake, stop!" I grabbed hold of his arm and yanked. He did stop, but he didn't make any attempt to say anything. Instead, he just pulled a cigarette from his pocket, stuck it in his mouth and lit it. "Nathan, come on, talk to me."

"Why? What can you have to say that'd make me feel better? Why would you be able to do that?" Oookaaay, it was very rare for Nathan to get that short with me. He was shaken, that much was obvious. I hated seeing him like this, but I also knew they only way to get him to snap out of it was to fight stubborn with stubborn.

"Because I'm your best mate, Nathan," I said bluntly. "You can talk to me." Silence. "I know that was the first time she's hit you."

"So?"

"So, think yourself lucky. Some kids get that every day. And I mean _kids_. That was nothing and to be honest, you did kinda bring it on yourself. You're fucking twenty-two and throwing yourself a fucking pity party over a half-arsed slap. Get over it."

Nathan blinked. "I was hoping for a bit more fuckin' sympathy, Blake."

"Why?" I challenged.

"Because I'm fuckin' sick of this!" he exclaimed, throwing his cigarette on the ground. "Community service, the fines, gettin' kicked out, bein' homeless! It's fucking pointless! I wanna go back to gettin' wrecked every weekend, passing out in my own vomit then my mum makin' me a bacon sarnie!"

"You wanna go back?! _You_ wanna go back?! You selfish fuck!" I cried out, shoving him. "You think I don't wanna go back?! I would give _anything_ to not be here! _I_ wanna go back! I wanna go back to when I was normal! I wanna go back to when my head wasn't full of bullshit! To when I could feel something! Back to when I wasn't scarred, to when I didn't have to meet some random every fucking week just to check I haven't wanted to top myself again! I'd give...I'd give anything...just to be me again."

Silence again. We just stared at each other, and I could feel tears in my eyes. I didn't think Nathan and I had ever been as prickly with each other as we had been after the last week or so. I didn't like shouting at him but these feelings had just been building up and up and apparently now was the time I was deciding to let them out.

Nathan was the first to speak. "So what do we do?"

I shrugged. "What can we do? Run away?"

"If you want to," Nathan replied seriously.

I barked out a bitter laugh. "What good would that do? We'd be found. People like us always get found." I shook my head. "Running away won't solve anything. We just need to face this like grown-ups and get on with it."

Nathan also laughed, but his sounded a lot sadder. "Grown-ups. What a load of shit."

I gave him a small smile. "Grown-ups," I repeated. "Just you and me against the world, Watson. Come on, let's go get a pint and forget the pile of shit today was ever happened."

Nathan shook his head. "Sorry Blakey, I'd love to but I've got place to be and other ladies to see."

Consider my interest officially piqued. "Oh yeah? What's that then?" I said lightly, but I could already feel that horrible twisting jealous side of me churning away. I knew _exactly_ who he planned on seeing.

"I need to go see Ruth and give her phone back. I'm gonna see if I can pick up where we left off last night," he smirked, giving me an outrageous wink.

I made a noise of repugnance. "Twat. You really have no shame, do you?"

"'Fraid not, love. What ya see is what ya get, you should know that by now." At least he was grinning, even if it was that cocky grin that often times made me want to punch his teeth down his neck.

I rolled my eyes. "Lucky for you, I am one of the _only_ people who likes what she sees when it comes to you. Alright fine, go see your hussy. I'll see you in the morning I guess."

"Bring me a coffee?" he called after me as I turned and trudged back to my car. I just shot a V into the air with my fingers. Jesus Christ, drinking partner or not, now I really did need a fucking pint.

* * *

**A/N- Please review!  
****Julian Quinn is played by Jeremy Irvine**

**Chapter Four Playlist  
**_**Girl All the Bad Guys Want –**_** Bowling For Soup  
**_**Goin' Down –**_** The Pretty Reckless**

**Chapter Five Playlist  
**_**Flavor of the Weak**_** – American Hi-Fi  
**_**Not Nineteen Forever –**_** The Courteeners  
**_**Dying to Believe –**_** Sleeping With Sirens**


	6. (Grand)Motherfucker

**A/N – Many thanks to Judging. All Day Every Day for reviewing!**

* * *

**Chapter Six - (Grand)Motherfucker**

I awoke the next morning thoroughly expecting a text from Nathan telling me all about his sordid night of passion with Ruth the Fit Volunteer. However, as I rolled over and unlocked my phone on the bedside table, I was greeted to nothing but the picture of me, Ella and Alfie I had set as my wallpaper. Don't get me wrong, I didn't exactly _want_ to hear any of the details given that A) my feelings towards the Nathan-and-Ruth situation were more than a little volatile, and B) if he had slept with her then that meant I'd lost the bet and owed him twenty quid.

That didn't make this any less weird, though. Oh good God, what if he was waiting for me at the community centre so he could describe it all in graphic detail, probably with hand motions included? I physically didn't think I had the capability to listen to that without vomiting all over the floor. I say 'waiting for me' like there was any chance Nathan would be awake before I arrived. Four days outta five I had to either scream in his ear or spill water on his face just to make sure he was up and functioning before everyone arrived at 8 on the dot. Somehow we'd managed to keep his homeless situation under wraps for the last two weeks, no mean feat given that Kelly could tune in and listen to our thoughts at any given moments.

_**You up? Need any food before I leave? **_I tapped out before jumping out of bed and heading to the bathroom for a lovely, well-deserved shower. There was still no reply when I checked my phone after my shower few minutes later, dressed in my usual ripped jeans and black Carlsberg tee already because fuck you, I could be a morning person when I wanted to be. Although, the Carlsberg top did kinda have me craving another pint of sweet, sweet beer right about now. Hm, maybe the whole 'no news was good news' thing applied to not hearing a word from Nathan. Despite the radio silence from the world's gobbiest Irishman, I still packed him up a couple of packets of crisps, a can of Fanta and some ham sandwiches. Not to toot my own horn, but I am literally the best friend anyone could ask for.

Lacing on my Old Skools and shoving a few wristbands onto my arm, I was ready for the day and headed for my car with a weird spring in my step. Nathan was clearly still asleep and if he hadn't said anything last night, maybe he really hadn't slept with the prissy volunteer. I couldn't keep the smug smile on my face as I thought of how much I could mock Nathan over the one female he'd failed to conquer. That, and the idea of that twenty quid I'd soon have in my hand was also appealing.

"Ohhh, we're halfway there! Woo-ah! Livin' on a prayer!" I sang as I pulled into the car park at precisely 7:37am, weirdly pepped for the day and think of ways to wake up Nathan involving taking my moneeey. "Take my hand, we'll make it, I sw- _what the fuck_?!" I killed the engine, squinting at the railings by the entrance doors. "Impossible." I got out of the car, still unable to comprehend what I was looking at.

This was wrong. So amazingly, irrevocably WRONG. Nathan was actually awake. More than that, he was awake, he was dressed and he was _outside_ the community centre before me, leaning against the metal railings smoking a joint.

"Oh my God, it's a fucking miracle," I joked as I approached him. "Nathan, you're actually up and moving around before twenty to seven? Are you ill?" I put a hand on his forehead like I was feeling for a fever.

"What, can't a guy get up early for a relaxin' smoke without gettin' interrogated?" he snapped, jerking away from me. Up close, his face looked drawn and a lot paler than usual, and his eyes had dark purple bags under them.

I raised my eyebrows. "Jesus, what crawled into your arse and died? I'd've assumed you'd be all happy and shit."

"What makes you think that?" he mumbled, dragging on his cigarette.

"I seem to recall you saying you were seeing Ruth last night and, I quote, 'picking up where you left off'? People don't tend to be this pissed off after they get laid. Did she reject you or something?" I tried to sound sympathetic, but the truth was I was now bursting to know what had happened to make him so pissed off.

"I don't feel the need to go into detail about what may or may not of happened last night," he sniped, still uncharacteristically angry. "Will you just fuck off and leave me alone?"

I quirked a brow. "Look, dickhead, we all get rejected, and it sucks. But don't you fucking _dare_ think you can speak to me like that just because you couldn't get your dick wet."

"Blake, seriously, I'm not in the mood."

"Why are you being so fucking menstrual?!" I snapped. "Need I remind you of that little discussion we had last night? You and me against the world, remember? Don't shut me out, Nate. I'm the only fucker here who understands you."

Nathan sighed heavily. "I'm not dealin' with this right now." And with that, he stubbed his cig out on the railings and stalked off back into the building, leaving me standing alone with the breeze blowing uncomfortably around my neck. I'd never seen him like this before. I was so used to the prickish, moronic, arrogant Nathan who didn't give a flying fuck about what he said to you or what was said to him. I didn't know this version, this snappish, bad-tempered version, and I didn't like it. Not one little bit.

Suddenly I wasn't in such a good mood anymore.

* * *

Surprisingly enough, Alisha ended up being the first of the others to arrive, wandering into the locker room just before eight, coming across me in my jumpsuit, sulking by the mirror with a fag hanging out of my mouth. She seemed shocked to see me there, though not as shocked as I was to see her.

"What are you doing here?" I mumbled, tapping off some excess ash then promptly taking another deep drag.

"Could ask you the same," she said coolly, opening her locker and placing her bag inside.

"I asked first."

She rolled her eyes and replied, "Police called, innit. 'Cause of me curfew break. They wanna talk to me."

"Oh." A beat of silence. "Why do you do it?"

"What do you mean?" she asked with a frown.

"Like, why keep breaking your curfew?" I questioned. "Surely it's just easier to, y'know, just stick to what the court told you?"

"I get that the idea of a social life might confuse ya," she said, surly. "But some of us have mates that we wanna see."

I snorted. "Mates. Yeah, your crew sound like right loyal mates." I flicked the stub of my fag away and stood up, taking a couple of steps closer to her. "Maybe I don't have a lot of friends, Alisha, but the ones I do stand by me. Alright, maybe they're not the coolest. Maybe we don't spend all our weekends posting Facebook statuses with hundreds of likes. Maybe my best mate in the entire world is one of the thickest, most irritating blokes on the planet. But let me ask you this: would any of your mates save your life if you needed them to? Would they be there if the one man who was supposed to love you more than anything else left you bloody and broken on your living room floor? I doubt it."

Alisha blinked, her mouth agape. "Blake, what happened to you?"

I shrugged. "Some shit that I had to get on with." I held out my wrist to her, not to display the bird like I had to her and Kelly yesterday, but so she could clearly see the scar that stretched three inches down diagonally from my hand. "Choose people carefully. You're a beautiful girl, Alisha, and I think that deep down – like, well deep down – you're actually a really lovely person. I wouldn't want something like this to happen to you because you made some shitty decisions about who you hang around with."

There was another few seconds of silence. Maybe I was imagining things, but I was sure I could see a few tears in Alisha's eyes. "You think I'm beautiful?" she said softly.

I nodded. "'Course I do. Sure, you annoy the fuck outta me-"

"Oh cheers."

"-But you are beautiful. I'd have to be blind not to see."

Alisha's mouth flickered with the ghost of a smile. "Why are you being so nice? I've been a right bitch to you."

"And I to you. So why don't we start over? Hi, I'm Blake, I'm twenty-two and my favourite food is Bird's Eye chicken dippers." I smiled properly at her, holding out my hand. She just stared at me with a quirked brow, and I rapidly withdrew my hand as I remembered her power. "Fuck. My bad."

"Don't worry about it," she smirked, and it was at that moment Sally the Dementor of Fun entered the locker room.

"Oh. Blake. I didn't realise you were already here," she frowned. "This won't count as an early start."

"No shit, 'Sal,' but thanks for stating the obvious," I said acidly.

She decided to blank that little snipe and instead gestured at Alisha to follow her. "Alisha, PC Wilson is here to see you. Please don't be rude and just answer his questions."

"Whatever," Alisha huffed. She looked at me and gave me a small nod of appreciation. "See you later, Blake."

"Peace out," I called after her as she followed Sally out of the room. Within the next ten minutes, Simon, Curtis and Kelly all came and went, getting changed, sending some texts, Kelly having a smoke before individually heading off outside for today's morning task of litter-picking around the centre before we were set loose on the rest of the estate that afternoon. I stayed back still, though, hoping Nathan would appear so I could at least attempt to talk to him again, but no such luck.

Heaving out a sigh, I shoved my phone into my pocket and was just exiting the locker room when I suddenly heard Alisha scream out, "Fuck off! Get off me, you pervert!" Without a second thought, I took off in the direction of the yell, bursting into the main hall just in time to see Alisha come hurtling out of the probation office with tears streaming down her face.

"Alisha!" I shouted, but she just ran past me. "ALISHA!"

"Oh, fuck off, Blake! Just fuck off!" she yelled back, disappearing out of the hall and into the Ladies. Now I had two options here: let the 'fuck off' slide and try to stick to that starting again conversation from the locker room, or, take the 'fuck off' to heart and resume being complete bitches to each other. While I won't lie and say that the latter didn't hold some appeal – I didn't really need anymore friends and, in the words of Nathan from Day 1, she seemed well high-maintenance – I knew I had to go with the former because if there was one thing I'd learned from being lumped with these 200 hours, it was that maybe I did need to try being a nicer person.

"Oh goddamn it," I mumbled, following her. I found her hunched over a sink, tears streaming down her face. I walked up and stood at the sink next to her, deciding to look into the mirror rather than stare straight at her. "I'm gonna ignore what you just said because you're clearly fucking traumatised. What just happened?"

"Nothin'," she sniffed, not looking up.

"'Nothing' doesn't make a bad bitch cry," I said gently.

Now she looked up, but she did the same as I had, only looking at me through the reflection of the grungy mirror. "That fuckin' twat policeman...he...he touched my wrist...he tried...he tried to-"

"Don't say anything else if you don't want," I quickly said, not wanting Alisha to go into details as I now had a pretty decent picture of what she'd been through. "It isn't your fault. You know that, right?"

"Then why is this happening to me?" she demanded.

"Why is this happening to any of us?" I countered. "We didn't ask for this, we all got dealt a shit hand the day of the storm."

"You didn't," she pointed out. "Nothing hurts you now. You could live forever if you wanted."

"You don't know that," I argued. "And I don't know that. I don't really know anything. Yeah, so we know nothing physically on the outside can hurt me, but what else? Can cancer still get me? If I hing myself off the Empire State Building, will that kill me? If I have sex with someone, will I still get pleasure from it? I don't know. I don't fucking know, and it scares the shit out of me."

"But no one's gonna try and rape you because you gave 'em a high-five," she said sadly.

"No, you're right, they're not," I agreed. "But maybe...and don't think I'm calling you a slut or nothing, but maybe...these powers are extensions of the people we are."

"The fuck you on about?" Okay, so maybe I had hit a nerve with the slut thing.

"Think about it. Nothing hurts me, right? I never let anything mentally hurt me because of the shit I went through with my ex, now suddenly I can't feel physical pain. I'm guessing Kelly worries what everyone thinks of her, she hears thoughts. You've...had a few men in your life, now you can force sex on contact. It all makes sense when you think about it."

"So you are calling me a slut," Alisha stated, her tone hard.

I faltered for a second. "I mean, in a roundabout fashion...maybe? But not in a bad way!" I had shot myself in the foot well and truly with this one. "There's nothing wrong with liking a lot of sex. Maybe just choose your men a little better."

"You're shit at making someone feel better, you know that?" At first I thought she was still pissed off, then I saw the tiny little smile on her face.

"I've been told," I said with a small laugh.

The door suddenly opened behind us, and in the reflection of the mirror I saw Sally walk in, interrupting us for a second time in literally twenty minutes. "Are you okay?" she softly asked Alisha.

"And that's my cue to leave," I sighed. I placed my hand on her shoulder, on her cardigan where her power wouldn't affect me. "Think about what I said, yeah?" Alisha nodded slowly, so I took that as my indication to leave her alone with the probation worker. Of course, I did make sure to shoot Sally a venomous look as I left the loos; I was starting to really fucking hate that bitch.

* * *

Oh God, the old people were back. Seriously, what was it with the over sixties thinking that us young offenders actually _enjoyed_ making them cups of tea and listening to stories of "when I were a lad?!" There was only so many times I could pretend to nod and act interested in stories of how Maggie Thatcher ruined/saved England and the miners strikes.

Still, I had to admit that by mid-afternoon, I was actually half-enjoying myself. I'd abandoned making what seemed like endless cups of tea and taken to the dancefloor with Alisha, Curtis, Kelly and Simon. James Blunt's _You're Beautiful_ was playing over the speakers, a very guilty pleasure song of mine that I'd loved ever since it had first come out.

I looked around at the others. Curtis and Alisha were dancing side-by-side with two other old people, Simon was awkwardly waving his arms in the air as he danced with an elderly woman, Kelly was doing some hoppy-dance-type chav thing with the dude in the wheelchair from the other day, and Nathan was sitting in a chair, still sulking about God knows what. He hadn't spoken to any of us properly all day, and after this morning's outburst there was no way I was gonna be the one to break the ice first. He hadn't even insulted Simon, which got me really worried.

Admittedly, as I attempted to join Christine and one of her male friends in some kind of weird waltz-style dance to Blunt's dulcet tones flowing through the speakers, I couldn't help but keep stealing glances at him. He was just so...motionless, staring blankly at the wall ahead with his thumbnail between his teeth; I hated seeing him like this, and I hated not being able to do anything about it.

"Staring at your fancy man, my love?" Christine said slyly, turning her head to follow my gaze.

"Don't you start, Christine, he's being a right prick today," I huffed, unwillingly tearing my gaze away from Nathan to look at her. She let out a small chuckle. "What are you laughing at, eh?"

"You, Blake," she chortled. "Go and see what's wrong with him, then. Isn't that what a 'best friend' should do since that's what you insist you are?"

Now it was my turn to laugh, genuinely amused by the old bat's gall. "You kill me, Christine, you really do. I've already _tried_ to see what's wrong with him. He won't talk to me."

"You young'uns have no drive, do you?" she tutted. "We are women, Blake, darling. When men don't want to answer us, we _make_ them. Consider this a life lesson from someone who's made the rounds a few times; men like pushy women, it shows you have fight. Now go over there and make that boy give you some answers!"

"Alright, alright! God, now I get what you mean by pushy women," I mock grumbled, but I moved past her and headed towards the gigantic ball of male angst sitting ahead of me. When I was no more than about ten foot away, I saw Nathan actually stir. He made as though to get up, and I smiled at him, thinking he'd seen me. He didn't. Instead, he pulled a face of revulsion and leapt up from his chair with a cry of strangled horror. He pushed his way through the crowd of dancing OAPs and practically sprinted out of the doors, the glass wobbling as they shut with a bang.

Stopping dead in my tracks in complete shock, I turned to face back to Christine, who merely shrugged in a _What can ya do? k_ind of way. I rolled my eyes. Fucking old people.

* * *

Another hour passed. The old people_ finally _dispersed from the community centre for the final time, and us ASBOees were sent to the locker rooms to change back into our jumpsuits for the next three hours of litter picking. Nathan still hadn't returned from doing his runner, and I knew we needed to find him because I was starting to get seriously worried. Him randomly running away plus his freakish bad mood seemed like an equation for suicide or a drugs overdose, and I for one did not want to find my best friend lying prone in a muddy ditch somewhere.

Once we'd started making tracks, it didn't actually take that long. We found him skulking underneath the flyover. He was leaning against one of the concrete pillars and smoking.

"Nathan!" I called to him, causing him to turn to look at us. Suffice to say, he didn't look particularly chuffed to see us marching towards him.

"What happened to you?" Curtis directed at him as we got closer.

"I will not be in a room where that song is playin'," Nathan replied, taking a drag on his cigarette. "Line in the sand, my friend." The five of us clad in orange all arranged ourselves around him where he was sitting. He looked slightly uncomfortable.

"Some old woman was lookin' for you," Kelly told him. Nathan looked even more uneasy, his eyes twitching around like he was thinking about something. Suddenly, Kelly's eyes widened in repulsion and she exclaimed, "You shagged her?!"

"_What_?!" I yelped. We all looked in shock from her, then to Nathan, who looked at us and gave a pathetic half-smile, dragging on his cigarette again. No. No, no, no, _no_, that was not true. It wasn't. Nathan did _not_ have sex with a fucking geriatric. If he had, I was about to puke in my mouth.

"Yeah, yeah, nice one!" he grinned weakly. "I gave her a right good seein' to!" We all saw straight through his feeble attempt to deny it. It wasn't like he had done too good a job at disguising it. He must've been thinking about it for Kelly to hear him. Various sounds of disgust were echoed around the group as I said, completely emotionally traumatised, "You have _got_ to be kidding me."

"You totally screwed her!" said Alisha with antipathy.

"...No! No!" Nathan cried, scrambling to his feet as Alisha shrieked with laughter.

"You _nailed_ that old woman?!" said Curtis disgustedly, pointing at Nathan with his litter-picker. "Nah! That is wrong!"

"Did you enjoy it?" Simon questioned him, and despite the absolutely sickening situation we were now a part of, I was actually kind of glad the little weirdo had a window of opportunity in which to pay Nathan back for all the shitty remarks he'd made to Simon.

"Shut up, you little freak!" shouted Nathan, jabbing at Simon furiously.

"I think he enjoyed it," Simon said, grinning at the rest of us.

I didn't want to ask the next question, but at this point I felt like I needed some serious clarification on what in the name of fuck was going on in here on this day. "So let me get this straight. You fucked a grandma? Like an actual, eighty-plus-year-old grandmother?!"

"She hasn't got any grandkids!" Nathan snapped.

"And that makes it so much better?" I retorted.

"Are you into that?!" Curtis demanded, still looking like he might vomit...which made two of us.

"No!" Nathan insisted. He made a noise of defeat. "She didn't look like that when we started! Remember that bird Ruth, from Tuesday? Beautiful, yeah?" He motioned an hourglass shape with his hands, and despite the fact I knew we were discussing an old woman, that rapidly-familiar jealousy still decided to make an appearance; I was sure I'd inadvertently let out a small growl. "That wrinkly old bint? That's her! It was the storm. It made her young again."

"Please," Alisha giggled. "_Please_ tell me you didn't-" She proceeded to make an exceptionally explicit and suggestive gesture that involved her fingers and tongue (I'm not going into detail, use your imagination.) Nathan didn't need to say anything. The beaten and tragic look on his face was enough to confirm that yes, yes he had. I had to swallow hard to stop my breakfast making a reappearance while everyone else shrieked and cackled with laughter. I couldn't bring myself to laugh; he looked like he was suffering from some serious post-coital PTSD, as I'm sure anyone would be when faced with a pair of wrinkly tits bouncing away in front of them.

"He did! For God's sake!" screeched Alisha as Nathan gave us all a really aggravated smile and stalked off. I wanted to run after him, really I did, but what would I say? There really was nothing I could do to make this better. Now I knew exactly why he hadn't wanted to speak to me all day.

Evidently, Kelly felt bad for blurting out Nathan's mishap as did she hurry after him to what I guessed was apologise. From where I was stood with Alisha, Curtis and Simon, I couldn't hear what either of them were saying. However, whatever it was Nathan was spitting out, it offended Kelly, as, "Granny fucker!" was soon echoing around the surrounding area. Wow, we were in for an awkward afternoon.

* * *

This had ended up being one of the longest Fridays of my motherfucking life. Not only had I arrived before everyone else, but somehow I had now ended up being the last person left in the locker room at the end of the day. Changed back into my usual clothes, I was just placing my things back into my backpack when a hand closed my locker, making me jump. I looked up to see Nathan staring at me. "Hey," he mumbled.

Shucking my backpack up onto my shoulders, I then crossed my arms. "So now you want to talk to me."

He let out a groan. "Blakey, don't make this any harder for me than it already is. I know I've been a bit of a knob."

I snorted derisively. "'A bit' is a fucking understatement. You know, I totally get why you'd be a twat to the rest of the guys, but me? That really fucking hurt, Nathan. Like, a lot."

"You know I don't do it on purpose." He could barely meet my eye, and for some reason that irritated me even more.

"That doesn't mean it doesn't piss me off!" I exploded, my foot flying out and kicking him in the shin. "We've always been a hundred percent honest with each other and you couldn't tell me about this?! I'm supposed to be your best friend! Seventeen years, Nathan! Does that mean anything to you?!"

"I was embarrassed!" he insisted guiltily. "What, you think I wanted everyone knowing I put my penis – my poor, beautiful penis – inside something that may as well be a corpse?! I'm fuckin' traumatised, Blake!"

"TMI, Nathan," I grimaced. "T. M. I. No, of course you didn't, and I totally get that. But I'm not just 'everyone,' am I?"

He sighed. "No. I guess you're not." Sigh #2, accompanied by him running a hand through his hair. "I keep fuckin' this up, don't I?"

I shrugged. "Depends what you mean by 'this.' If you mean our flow of conversations recently, then yes. If you mean our friendship...of course not, you big dolt." I stepped forward and wrapped my arms around his waist, pulling him into a tight hug. His arms came up around my shoulders, pulling me in, and his cheek rested on the top of my head.

"I'm really fuckin' sorry, B," he said quietly, one of those rare times he could actually be serious.

"I know you are," I replied, my voice a tad muffled given my head was smushed up against his chest. "Just don't shut me out again. We're getting through this together, remember?"

"Together," he repeated. "Sherlock and Watson."

"And hey, look at the positive side of this," I said brightly when we let go of each other.

Nathan quirked a brow. "What the fuck positive have you managed to see in this disaster of epic proportions?"

I smirked at him as I took my purse from my backpack, opened it and proceeded to hand him a twenty pound note. "Technically, you did win the bet. Use your winnings wisely. Might I recommend a large bottle of vodka to drown these memories in?"

"You bitch!"

* * *

I decided the best thing to do would be to leave Nathan be for the weekend. Regardless of our heart-to-heart at the end of the shift, he still had a lot of mental shit he needed to come to terms with. If he needed to talk anything else through, he knew where I was. So I just got on with my days, keeping myself occupied and trying to ignore the minor separation anxiety I was experiencing. I just...I really wanted him to be okay.

Monday morning rolled around far too quickly, and after 48 hours of nothing from Nathan, I hoped he'd had enough time to clear his head and get things back to normal. I even made him a travel mug of coffee as a final peace offering, just in case he was still narky.

And yet, when I arrived at the community centre at my usual early time, things were clearly half-back to normal as Nathan was still fast asleep on his mattress. I thought it would be far too harsh to scream at him or chuck water in his face, so instead I resorted to sitting down next to him and poking him in the rib with my foot a few times until his eyes fluttered open. Making a loud groaning noise, he rolled over onto his side and looked at me.

"Mornin'," I said brightly, handing him the travel mug of still-warm coffee.

"Hey you," he mumbled, his voice still thick from heavy sleep. He took the mug and gulped down a large sip from it. "What's all this about, eh?"

"What, a girl can't bring her favourite homeless Irishman a comforting coffee without there being an ulterior motive?" I retorted.

"I've been homeless for over two weeks and you've never brought me morning coffee before," he pointed out.

"I've brought you plenty of things!" I argued. "Every day! Sandwiches and crisps and shit."

"Sandwiches aren't a, quote-unquote, 'comforting coffee.'"

"It hurts that you're doubting me." All I got in return was a raised eyebrow. "Alright, fine, you got me. I wanted to make sure you're okay. You know...after Friday."

At the mention of Friday, Nathan's face immediately clouded over. Okay, so bringing _that_ up was clearly the worst idea I'd had in a while. However, it didn't take much more than another second before his face appeared to brighten back up. "Okay? Sure I'm okay, Blakey! Never better!" he exclaimed, falsely enthusiastic.

"Woah, Nate, chill your titties," I said quickly, a tad alarmed at his almost manic demeanour. "Just wanted to make sure, no need to go all Joker on me."

"You know me, Blake, not one to hold a grudge," he replied, still overtly cheerful. He scooched himself around to my side so he could put his arm around me. "It's a new week, a fresh start. No shit is gonna happen this week. I've got a good feelin', ya know?"

"Riiiight," I said, unconvinced. "Well can that good feeling lead you in the direction of a sink? You smell like you haven't showered in three days."

"That will be because I haven't."

"You fucking disgust me."

* * *

"I told ya there was other people that got messed up by the storm and _you_ didn't even believe me," Kelly informed Nathan twenty minutes later in the locker rooms.

"Yeah, well, I was wrong, wasn't I?" he retorted, leaning against his locker. "There's a hurricane of weird shit out there." As a response, Alisha repeated the same graphic gesture she'd used yesterday. "Oh, another oral sex gag? Brilliant!" he scoffed sarcastically.

"Is it weird that I actually feel kind of relieved that there are other people like us?" I said, pulling my jumpsuit over my legs. "I don't feel like such a freak now."

"Blake, you were a freak before you had powers," Nathan snorted.

"We need to be ready for when they come after us," Simon suddenly said, shutting his locker.

"What are you talkin' about?" demanded Kelly.

"The other people who got caught up in the storm," he answered.

"Why would they come after us?" asked Curtis, throwing out his arms in a kind of _Well?_ gesture.

"Because that's what people do," Simon said _very _intensely, and something about that tone of voice made my stomach drop.

"Yeah, well if they do, we'll just tell them it was all your fault," Nathan said dismissively, turning and opening his locker.

"Nathan, don't be a prick," I hissed, slapping him in the chest as he turned to his locker. However, still feeling unnerved, I pulled a cigarette out of my pocket with a shaky hand and stuck it in my mouth, lighting it as I did so. Nicotine was one of the only things that could calm me down at the worst of times, and right now, I classed this as a 'worst time.' The shaking of my hand began subsiding almost as soon as the first puff of smoke left my lips.

Of course, that was totally shattered when out of the blue, Nathan nervously said, "You know that…note you found in your locker? I think it _was_ talking about the probation worker." We all turned to look at him. There, taped to the door of his locker, was a missing persons poster of Tony, the first probation worker. Scribbled harshly along the bottom in black Sharpie were the words I KNOW. All of us had gathered around Nathan's locker, all of us just staring at the note. My vision blurred with tears of sheer fear. No. Please God, no, this wasn't happening. This _couldn't_ be happening. I was too fucking young to go to prison!

"I'm gonna be sick," I gagged, dropping my cig and scuffing it out on the floor. Reaching up and wiping my eyes, I took a couple of deep, calming breaths and instead said, "Right. Okay. Time to breath. Let's think logically. Right. Okay._ Okay_.It's obvious that they're just trying to scare us. You said so yourself the other day, Nate, they'd have gone to the police by now. If that had happened, we'd be in those God-awful striped uniforms eating fried dog food for breakfast and dancing the Jailhouse Rock. But we're not. We're here, and we're safe. We are safe. We just need to calm the fuck down and relax." Was it getting hot in here or was it just me?

"Might I recommend takin' a leaf out of your own book, Blakey?" Nathan suggested.

"Shut up, you mug. Blake's right," Alisha said quietly. I went to give her hand a reassuring squeeze – glad our apparent truce from last week was a permanent thing – then quickly remembered her power. My arm froze in mid-air, and I had to make as though I was stretching. Alisha looked at me weirdly and moved to the mirror to put on her make-up.

"See?" I jabbed my thumb in her direction. "The girl talks sense. Now let's take a moment to think. Who do we know who may or may not know that we _killed our probation worker_?" I whispered the last four words.

"Do you think it could be Sally?" suggested Simon.

"Who's Sally?" asked Curtis.

"The probation worker, you twat," I replied.

"Ooh, _Sally_?" Nathan said in a really stupid voice. "How do you two know her name?"

"She told us!" said Simon.

"On numerous occasions, you fucking bell-end," I said harshly.

"Well you two are twats because 'Sally' didn't show up till the day after we killed the other probation worker," he retorted. "I suppose you both know his name to?"

"Don't call me a twat!" I exclaimed irately at the same time Simon said "Tony!"

Nathan mock-gasped, "Do you love him?" He conveniently ignored me as well, I noticed.

"Don't be a dick, Nathan," I sighed, smacking him in the back of the head. "It's not our fault that you seem to have lost the capability to listen to anyone properly."

"He's right, though," Kelly input. "She weren't here."

"If I'm invisible, I can see if anyone puts anything else in our lockers," Simon offered.

"Hey, good idea," I smiled, throwing an arm around his shoulders. "It's like we've got our own personal CCTV camera. No sarcasm intended."

"Yeah, sounds like a plan," agreed Curtis, who turned to look at Alisha as she applied her lip gloss and flashed her his supposed 'attractive face'. "You alright with that, yeah?"

Apparently though, Alisha was attracted to people who looked like they were having trouble taking a piss as she replied with a smirk, "Works for me." Oh God, it was happening. We had our first forming hook up, if we ignored what had transpired between Nathan and Wertham's own Nora Batty.

"Go on then," said Curtis, reluctantly tearing his eyes away from Alisha and looking at Simon. "Turn invisible." We all looked at Simon expectantly.

"I can't do it when everyone's watching me," he said, looking like a rabbit caught in some headlights.

"So I guess it's like pissin' at a urinal if you've got a tiny cock?" Nathan taunted, pointing at Simon's crotch. Simon blushed slightly.

"Oh come off it. You're being such a dick today, Nathan," I said scornfully. "It's not exactly like any of us can control our powers is it?" My words fell on deaf ears as everyone still looked at Simon with expectancy. However, it evidently wasn't going to happen as Simon remained perfectly visible.

"Well, that's, er, really impressive," Alisha said with only a slight undertone of sarcasm, heading out the door, followed by Kelly, Curtis and Nathan. I put my hand on Simon's arm and gave him a kind of sympathetic smile before following them. Monday morning and already we'd had some stupid cryptic shit. So much for 'new week, fresh start,' hey?

* * *

**A/N – I hope you all had a very Merry Christmas and enjoy a prosperous New Year! Here's to 2020! Please review! Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Six Playlist  
**_**wonderful life –**_** Bring Me The Horizon**


	7. Africa by Toto

**A/N – It's been great to see a couple more reviews for the last chapter, if you guys could keep that up, it would mean _everything_ to me. Your reviews, thoughts and advice are what keep my stories moving, or else I feel like I'm writing for no one. Many thanks to Judging. All Day Every Day, SerenTheWitch and Guest for reviewing!**

* * *

**Chapter Seven – Africa by Toto**

Trudging through the entrance hall, we were met by some (pretty good-looking, even my emo arse had to admit) guy who was probably a few years older than us. Twenty-five, twenty-six at a push. He introduced himself as a worker for a charity that specialised in sending clothes to disadvantaged countries. He asked us each to grab a bin bag that was on the floor and follow him to the main hall.

"Okay, so all these clothes have been donated by members of the public," he told us with an 'I'm _such_ a good person' smile, opening the hall door and gesturing to the gigantic pile of clothes in the middle of the room.

"Holy fuck, that's a _lot_ of clothes," I muttered. This was gonna take us for-fucking-ever.

"We need to sort them before we ship them out to Africa," Charity Guy continued.

"Just another day in paradise," said Alisha with derision.

"Yeah well, I'm sure the people receiving them will be really grateful for all your hard work," said Charity Guy, that infuriating smile never wavering.

"Yeah, they should be! They're getting a new wardrobe," Alisha retorted, dumping her bin bag in the pile, as did Nathan, Kelly and Curtis.

"That's so fucking wrong, man," I laughed, tossing my own bin bag as hard in the direction of Clothing Mountain as I could. It didn't occur to me that the bag wasn't sealed until what seemed like every last bit of fabric in that bag were also sailing through the air. Charity Guy gave me a really weird look, like he was expecting an apology.

I sighed heavily; good-looking or not, this guy was definitely gonna get on my tits before the end of the day. "Shit. My bad, dude."

"It's...it's fine. Now, these are the categories they need to be sorted in to," he carried on his speech. "It's children's clothes, shoes, coats, that kind of thing. Okay, so if you've got any questions, just ask."

Nathan thrust his hand into the air. Oh God. "If a bear and a shark had a fight, who would win?"

Before Charity Guy had a chance to reply, I interrupted with, "The shark, obviously. Haven't you seen _Jaws_? Those motherfuckers would rip a bear apart!"

"Yeah, but sharks haven't got any legs. They'd be fucked on land!" Nathan argued.

"No way," I insisted. "I bet if sharks put enough brain power into it, they could use their fins as legs. Bears can only swim in shallow freshwater, not the ocean. Ergo, shark over bear."

"Pfft. You are so wrong," Nathan snorted. He pointed at Charity Guy. "You're the only person who can settle this. Bear or shark?"

There was a silence as Charity Guy stared at the two of us in what I assumed was disbelief. Or confusion. Or just plain WTF. "If anyone's got any _relevant_ questions, just ask." Alisha giggled at him. Charity Guy turned to go, before looking back at me and Nathan and saying, "If it's on dry land, I'd bet on the bear."

"No way! It'd be the shark! You're in denial!" I shouted after him as he left. He didn't turn back. "Pussy." However, not one to skip over what I consider important details, I_ had _noticed Alisha staring after him with a look that just screamed that she thought he was hot and was possibly considering ways she could ride him like a Harley. Personally, though I had already admitted he was good-looking, I had turned myself away from muscled up blondes a long-arse time ago, and do-gooders like him made me want to pull my teeth out. Give me a skinny dark-haired bad boy any day.

_Now where could I find one of those…? _I thought with a smile, watching Nathan launch himself into the side of the pile of clothing the second the doors closed behind Charity Guy, followed by Alisha and Curtis and Kelly. Sure, why not. I joined in and started burying my way underneath one of the other lumps of miscellaneous fabric, trying to ignore the fusty kind of smell. I closed my hands around some kind of fabric and tunnelled back out again.

As I emerged back into the light, I realised I'd grabbed a pair of tan coloured plus-size woman's control knickers. Who the _fuck_ donates that to a continent where 'plus size' was the equivalent of about seven stone?! I almost dropped them, but I grinned to myself, coming up with an idea.

Hehehe, prank time.

Nathan now had his back to me, rooting through a different pile. As quietly as I could, I snuck up behind him and pulled the knickers down over his head, the crotch covering his eyes, nose and most of his mouth.

"Argh! I'm blind! What the fuck?!" he shrieked, reaching up and yanking them off his face as I screeched with laughter. "Bloody hell, Blake! You nearly gave me a fuckin' heart attack!"

"Who's the panty sniffer now?" I giggled.

"Oh you are so payin' for that one!" he grinned. Quick as anything, he jumped at me and picked me up as I protested loudly. He swung me around a few times before releasing me and sending me flying through the air. Though I was screaming as many profanities I could think of to start, as soon as I hit the pile of clothing with a weird huffing noise, I had to burst out laughing.

"Dickhead!" I reached up and seized hold of the cuff of his jumpsuit, pulling as hard as I could to yank him down next to me. Now he was the one laughing, slapping me with a nondescript piece of fabric as I fought back with a holey West Ham footie top. We scuffled for a few seconds before collapsing back into the clothes, out of breath but still full of laughter.

"Get a room, fuckers!" Curtis called at us, before suddenly shoving Alisha so hard she toppled over into the pile with a shriek. Get a room? Oh come on, there was no way I was being that obvious. I was _not_ flirting with Nathan Young. I wasn't! It was banter! Light-hearted banter! Nothing that serious...was it? No. I'd just choose to ignore that butterflies-in-the-tummy feeling I got the second Nathan had picked me up.

"You're one to talk," I shot back at Curtis, gesturing between him and Alisha, who was dusting herself down.

"Don't be a baby," Alisha said with a grin.

"Hey, check this out!" said Kelly suddenly, pulling a pair of SpongeBob pyjama bottoms over the top of her jumpsuit.

"Beautiful, _dahling_," I said quickly, rolling to the side and scrambling to my feet. Scanning around, I reached into one of the piles and pulled out what looked like an actual ballerina's tutu dress. I pulled it down over my head and twirled around in a circle, feeling like a princess. "Swan Lake, motherfuck-ARGH!" Attempting a pirouette, I caught my foot on a rouge t-shirt and slipped, landing headfirst in the pile of clothes Nathan had started looking through.

"Very graceful, B," he commented, unearthing a ski boot and laughing. "Skiwear, classic. Try walkin' ten miles to the well in these!"

"Yeah, it's well practical to send them to Africa," I said sarcastically. "Who the fuck donates skiwear to a country completely devoid of snow?"

"Twats," he said simply, unearthing a pair of matching ski goggles and pulling them on. "Hey, hey, hey! Who am I?" He proceeded to make a noise like someone had thrown a Chihuahua into a blender. When he'd finished, none of us had a clue what had just come out of his mouth. "Come on! Okay. Alright, alright, I'll give you a clue: I'm an annoying cunt!"

I snorted. "Well that don't take a lot of working out."

"Funny," he retorted. "I'm Bono!" he said as if it was obvious.

"Ah yes, every Irishman's – and vegan's – true idol," I sniggered. "And possibly one of the most overrated musicians in history, just ahead of Phil Collins."

He sighed. "Oh dear, Blakey. We clearly need to educate your taste in music even more than I realised."

"Hey!" I protested. "My taste in music is-" I was interrupted by the front door opening and some rando girl in a leather jacket and baseball cap walked in, accompanied by Sally.

"Who's she?" asked Nathan, as if we had a clue.

I was surprised when Kelly answered, "This girl I had a fight with. I've gotta do some 'restorative justice' bollocks with her."

I smirked, "Have fun. Those sessions are shit. They tried to get me to have one with my ex after I dropped that bowling bowl on him, and they had to end it ten minutes in because I tried to throttle him with the stupid Tory-lookin' tie the fuckhead was wearing."

Kelly could only look at me like I was completely mental whilst Nathan gestured at Sally and said, "Hey, hey. Bono, yeah?"

"What?" was Sally's confused and totally bored reply.

"I'd just ignore him if I were you," I said blandly, rubbing at my left temple.

Nathan dropped his arms in a frustration and said, "I don't know why I bother."

"Then don't," I suggested. Sally told Kelly to go into the probation office, and Kelly very unwillingly did so, standing up with a huff just as Charity Guy came back into the hall.

Alisha was holding up a really pretty white and red-polka dotted dress against herself, and Charity Guy grinned at her and said, "Suit's you." As he walked away again, I saw Alisha give him a seductive smile. Curtis apparently noticed too, as I watched him throw the trainer in his hand to the ground in irritation.

I couldn't help but roll my eyes at Alisha's expression. I had truly begun to like the girl and we could possibly even end up as friends, but I swear to God, every single guy who had walked through the community centre doors was automatically attracted to her. Granted, yes, she was beautiful, but her parading around like she was queen of the fucking world was the reason she probably rubbed a lot of people up the wrong way, myself included on many occasions. With a defeated sigh, Curtis turned his attention back to the shoe table. Poor guy. I felt for him. Him and Alisha would have made a proper adorable couple.

"Uh oh," Nathan muttered to me. "Looks like the breaks have been pulled on that Shag Train."

"What a charming image," I muttered back, pulling a pair of rollerskates out of the pile. "Hey, check out these!"

"Ah, nice one!" Nathan exclaimed, ripping them out of my hand and pulling them onto his feet.

"Hey! I wanted those!" I whined like a little girl.

"Don't shit yourself, Blakey. Look." He also held up a pair of skates. "What size are you again?"

"Er…an eight," I admitted, blushing slightly.

"Fuckin' hell, your cock would be massive if you were a bloke!"

"Nathan. You are sick."

"So today's your lucky day, Bigfoot," he joked, handing the other skates to me. "_Voila_, size eight."

"Funny," I said sourly, putting them on and very shakily standing up.

"Let's roll. Get it? _Roll_? Cuz we're on rollerskates?" Nathan said, gesturing me to follow him to the wall he was leaning on.

"Never make that joke again. And what are we doing, exactly?" I asked him, still extremely unstable on the skates, almost falling arse over tit precisely twice and I hadn't even attempted to move yet.

"This." Nathan pushed himself away from the wall and grabbed my hand so I was rolling along beside him without moving my feet. After a few seconds, I picked up enough confidence to skate by myself, but kept hold of Nathan's hand anyway. There was no denying it, I looked like Bambi on ice.

As we approached the windows to the probation office, Nathan pulled me to him. He slipped one arm around my waist so and stuck out our holding hands in a ballroom dance-style.

Out of nowhere, Nathan opened his mouth and began to make a noise like an opera singer. A tone-deaf opera singer, mind you, and I couldn't help but snort at him. We peered into the window as we glided past, trying to have a nose. Kelly looked absolutely bored shitless, and the other girl looked like she was in a right strop, although Kelly did grin when she saw us.

"We got her to laugh, so I feel like our work here is done," I said with a cheeky grin.

"Good Samaritan deed for the day completed," Nathan agreed. "Back to Mount Fabric we go." As we tried to turn around, Sally yanked open the office door, making us both jump and almost lose our footing.

"Both of you, take the rollerskates off!" We didn't move. "And the goggles," she added to Nathan. "TAKE THEM OFF!" The sudden shout made me jump so badly that I completely lost my balance in those pissing skates and toppled to the floor with a startled yell. Because I was still holding Nathan's hand, of course I dragged him down as well, causing him to landing in a heap on top of me.

"Shit! You okay?" he asked, concerned. His arms were either side of my head, his green eyes staring into my brown ones and our mouths just inches apart. My heart was hammering in my chest. Could I...should I...? No. No, I couldn't. It would ruin everything.

"Can't feel pain, remember? I'm fine," I reminded him, quickly shoving him off me - probably more violently than needed - so I could sit up and unclip those skates.

"Ow! You might not, but I fuckin' can!" he protested, rubbing the back of his head as he too sat up and removed his own skates.

"Poor baby," I said with an eye roll, hooking my arms under his armpits and hauling him to his feet. "However will you cope?"

"I'm sure you're like eighty percent less sympathetic towards me since we got banged up," he grumbled as we walked back to where Alisha and Curtis were. Alisha had put on a silver minidress and climbed onto one of the tables, and Curtis was wearing a white top hat and carrying a cane. Both of them were laughing again. Hm, maybe things with them would be okay.

I picked up a silvery-white blazer and threw it to Nathan. "Hey, this is so you." He stuffed his arms into the sleeves and struck a John Travolta_ Saturday Night Fever _pose. I laughed at him and decided to wrap a full sized fur coat around my shoulders. This was the most fun we'd had the entire time we'd been on community service.

"YOU SLUT WHORE!" A sudden scream came from the probation office and Sally appeared, shoving the girl in the leather jacket out of the room towards the door. I didn't miss the very bloody nose that girl was now sporting, no doubt courtesy of a Bailey Special – a headbutt clean to the face.

"SHOVE OFF, YA TWAT!" Kelly yelled, and the next thing I knew, I was wiped out by a plastic chair sailing out of the office door and colliding with my chest.

"Motherfucker!" I grunted as I hit the linoleum floor with a dull _thunk_ sound. Rolling over, I shoved the chair off me and just sat there, watching the drama unfold as I tried to get some air back into my lungs. If there was one thing I'd noticed since developing this power, it was that trauma – to the chest or otherwise – now seemed to leave me much more breathless that it ever had before.

Kelly came storming out of the office herself, glaring after the other two. "I was try'na be nice!" She glowered at Nathan, Curtis, Alisha and I before turning and stomping from the hall.

I think that went pretty well," Curtis said flatly.

I couldn't help but snigger. "I told her that restorative justice was a shit idea," I input in a sing-song voice.

"I'm so fuckin' bored, man," Alisha moaned, yawning and hopping down from the table. "We deserve a break, right? I'm going outside. You coming?" she added that end part to Curtis, who gave her his 'sexy look' and the two of them headed out the door without a single look back at Nathan and I.

"Maybe I was wrong," noted Nathan. "Looks like the Shag Train is rollin' straight into Fuck Station."

"Seriously, will you stop saying that?" I said. "You sound like an up-and-coming serial rapist." I shucked the fur from around my shoulders and dumped it on the _COATS_ table. The two of us stayed in the hall for another twenty minutes, mindlessly throwing clothes at each other and trying to get a bit more done, which wasn't much given it was just the two of us at this point.

Eventually though, I stood up and stretched. "Jesus, my legs are dead, and if I spend anymore time staring at clothing, I am gonna lose it. I'm gonna go find Kelly. You coming?"

"Yeah, sure. I am _dyin'_ to know what happened," Nathan replied, taking off his blazer, and the two of us set

Kelly was standing around in the entrance hall, smoking and looking severely pissed off. When she saw us coming, she dropped her cigarette and stubbed it out before going into the locker room. We followed her in, Curtis catching up with us outta nowhere. Was it me, or did he look slightly traumatised? Naturally I looked around, but there was no Alisha.

"Praaaise restorative justice!" Nathan sang after Kelly.

"I was only sayin' that the lad she used to go out with was a dick!" she said defensively. "I was only bein' nice!"

"Oh yeah, you were bein' lovely," Nathan said sarcastically. "Right up until you threw the chair at her!"

"Cheers for that, by the way!" I said jokingly, pulling my jeans from my locker. "Can't wait to see the bruise from that! Next time, give a sister some warning!"

"Shit, yeah, sorry Blake," she apologised, but she was smiling. Couldn't deny her that, it had been funny. "Swear I wasn't aiming for ya."

Suddenly, Curtis slammed his hand against his locker and irately exclaimed, "You don't be doin' that shit around me!" I turned to look at him, and saw Simon standing by Curtis, a weird expression on his face. Curtis gave him a curious look. "You been in here all day?"

Simon grinned oddly at him, "Yep."

"And? Did anyone come in?" I asked urgently. "Did anything happen?"

With the creepy little smile still on his face, Simon replied, "No, nothing. No one came in."

Nathan gave a gasp and sardonically said, "That's an anti-climax!"

I elbowed him in the ribs. "Stop being a dick. It's not his fault that nobody decided to come in and leave another threatening note for us. At least I can sleep peacefully tonight." Nobody seemed to disagree with me, and the five of us continued changing back into our casual clothes without many more words being said.

By our standards, this had been a relatively successful, calm day. If I ignored the office equipment assault, that was. I was reflecting on a few things as I drove through the estate on my way home. Maybe the notes in Curtis and Nathan's lockers really were just pranks. Unless whoever it was had overheard our conversation this morning to leave Simon behind. No...no, that wouldn't be it, if someone had overheard us discussing someone's invisibility then we'd all be locked up in the mental unit, and believe me, I was _not_ going back there again. The people I'd had to talk to during group sessions during my two-week stay were fucking fruitcakes.

Turning down my estate block, I began to notice my car was making the strangest grinding sound. Every time I changed gear, it sounded like the gearstick was dragging against the engine or something, I don't know, I don't know how cars work! What I did know, however, was that smoke certainly shouldn't have been beginning to pour out from under the bonnet.

"Shit!" I cursed to myself, managing to park up and scramble out of the car, gripping my head with my hands. "_Shit_!" I wrenched the bonnet open and immediately choked on the excess smoke that blew out in the summer breeze. Oh brilliant, this was_ exactly_ what I needed. So much for a calm and relatively successful day.

* * *

A blocked engine radiator. Apparently I hadn't been taking as good care of the Polo as I thought. A panicked phone call to my dad that involved me telling him my car had blown up had then resulted in him driving over himself to see what the problem was. Of course, dearest darling Jason Harper was no mechanic and had absolutely zero idea what the fuck had happened, so then it was _him_ calling an actual mechanic and telling _him_ that my car had blown up.

Anyway, the short and short of it is, my engine was backed up with a load of fluid and shit and was gonna be out of commission for the next few days at the garage. My dad, bless him, was sweet enough to pay whatever the bill would be given that I was completely unemployed. Still, I wasn't exactly happy about not having a car. Sure, my legs worked, but I'd grown very a custom to being able to zip around the estate in a matter of moments, not the half an hour it would now take to bloody get anywhere.

As it was, I had no option but to be up bright and early the next morning to begin my walk to the community centre. It was a lovely day, as much as I hated to admit it. Maybe the sunshine and fresh air would do me some good. I was in relatively good spirits, taking in deep breaths to take in the crispness of the air, kicking up stones with my scuffed old Doc Martens and just generally appreciating the all around quietness of the estate at this hour.

Turning away from the suburban streets, I headed down a dirt track surrounded by trees that served as a decent shortcut. It also involved me having to walk past the flyover. Between the dead bodies we had stored there and last week's, ahem, revelation that took place beneath it, that lump of concrete was rapidly becoming my _least_ favourite place on the estate. Now I found myself wishing I had my car back even more.

As I approached the flyover, I saw Simon walking a few metres ahead of me.

"Simon!" He turned around hesitantly, as if he wasn't sure he'd heard me. I waved to him and jogged to catch up to him. "Hiya!"

"G-good morning," he said, sounding almost surprised that I'd talk to him, putting his iPod in his pocket. "How are you?"

"Oh, I'm fine. You?"

"I'm well, thanks. I thought you normally drove to the centre?"

"You would be correct, however my darling car decided to have a bitch-fit last night and will now be un-driveable for the foreseeable future."

"Oh. I see." There was a somewhat awkward silence in which I sort of regretted catching up with him. Then he pointed to my t-shirt. "I didn't realise you liked _Batman_?" He voiced it as a question.

"Hm?" I looked down at the symbol emblazoned on my off-shoulder t-shirt. "Oh, yeah. I love _Batman_. Anything DC, really. I've been a big fan since I was like, nine."

"I'm- I'm a fan too. I bought my first comic when I was seven," he replied.

"Really? Who's your favourite character?"

"I don't really have one. Maybe Mister Freeze. Do you?"

"Of course. I've always loved Harley. You know, Harley Quinn?"

"The Joker's girlfriend?"

"Yeah, her. She's amazing. But I didn't see her in _The Animated Series_ until way after it aired, so before Harley it was Catwoman. God, I wanted to be Catwoman so badly but I'm so bloody clumsy that _that_ could never happen." As if on cue, I got my foot caught under an exposed root as we headed down the dirt trail and tripped, landing flat on my face. "Fuck. Everything." I scrambled to my feet, dusting mud off my skinny jeans.

Simon laughed quietly. "I guess I can see where you're coming from."

"Hey!" I shoved him lightly in jest. "I'll have you know that-" I was interrupted by what sounded like heavy machinery. Or tractors. Simon and I rounded the first pillar of the flyover and were confronted with the sight of a load of builders with spades, jackhammers and even fricking bulldozers. Fuck. Fuck, fuck, fuuuuck!

"Oh shit! Ohhhh no," I hissed, tightly grabbing Simon's hand out of shock and fear. "Are they digging where we buried the probation worker?!"

"I think so. Ow!" he cried in pain, pulling his hand out of mine. He had several crescent-shaped indents in his palm; I hadn't even noticed I'd been digging my nails into him, let alone that hard.

"Oh my God, I am so sorry!" I said frantically.

"It's fine, don't worry about it," he said quickly, before hurrying over to the nearest builder. "Excuse me!"

"Yes, son?" said the builder good-naturedly.

"What are you building here?" Simon asked him.

"It's an environmental monitoring station, lad," said the builder. "It measures the carbon monoxide levels. Why do you ask?"

"Oh. It's just this- this thing we're doing at uni," I answered quickly. "A report on the local area. Thanks, sir." I grabbed Simon by the arm and dragged him away. The second we were out of earshot I rapidly said, "This is bad. We need to get to the community centre. Now." and the two of us took off at a much faster pace in that direction.

* * *

"Please let everybody be in one place, _please_ let everyone be in on place," I prayed as we got to the community centre about ten minutes faster than normal, extremely out of breath.

"It'll be okay," Simon promised me, just as a tan-coloured sedan swerved round to a stop in front of us. The driver's door opened, and of _course_ it just had to be fucking Sally who got out.

"Well my morning just keeps getting better," I mumbled, raking a hand through my hair. What had I done in the last 18 hours that had pissed off God so much? It was because I nicked that Oasis t-shirt from the charity pile, wasn't it.

"Hi!" Sally said cheerfully, and I couldn't help but notice that she was directing it solely at Simon. Insert classic, 'What am I, chopped liver?' gag here.

"Hi?" Simon sounded dumbfounded as to why she was paying him even a fleck of attention.

"Nice shirt, that colour really suits you," she complimented him.

"…B-blue," was all Simon said as I stood there with my mouth almost agape. What the _fuck_ was going on?!

"Are you okay?" Oh and now she was playing the concerned card, although she did also turn to look at me. "And you, Blake? You both look like you've seen a ghost."

With A+ comic timing, both Simon and I pulled the most unconvincing, teeth-baring smiles at her at exactly the same time. Believable, no, terrifying, yes. And lucky for us, terrifying enough that Sally let us go, the two of us hurrying past her into the building.

As we burst through the doors, there was nobody in sight. We checked the entrance hall, the main hall, the locker room, hell, I even checked the girls' toilets. Nothing.

"The roof!" Simon suddenly said.

"Good call," I replied, heading up the stairs that lead to the roof.

When Simon and I shoved our way through the roof door, sure enough, there was Nathan sitting in one of the chairs glaring at a wine bottle, his fingers pressed to his temples. Curtis was also there, reclining back on the lounger, his arm over his eyes.

"Okay, we have got one mega motherfucker of a problem!" I announced to the two of them.

"Will you shut up!" Nathan said snippily. "I nearly had it!"

"Alright, bitch boy, chill your shit," I retorted.

"What's he doing?" Simon asked Curtis.

"He's tryin' to smash the bottle with his mind," replied Curtis, sounding bored. Needless to say, Nathan started jabbing his arms at the bottle and making constipated noises in his attempt to go all Carrie White on it. Curtis sat up and stared at Nathan in exasperated disgust. "I think he's gonna shit himself."

Nathan's face was becoming more and more annoyed, until he flung his leg out and knocked the bottle flying with an angry cry of "Bullshit!" The bottle hit the concrete and smashed into smithereens at my feet.

"You done?" I said, using the same bored tone Curtis had used earlier. "Now will you _please_ shut the fuck up and listen to us?!"

"I've got a power, I know it! I can feel it in my balls!" he insisted, not shutting the fuck up, not listening, and instead grabbing at his gonads. Charming.

"We've got a problem!" Simon tried to get through to him instead.

Nathan totally ignored him as well and turned to Curtis. "It's like a soft…vibratin'. You get that, yeah?"

Curtis raised an eyebrow at him and tersely said, "No."

"They're gonna dig up the bodies!" Simon and I exclaimed at the same time.

Nathan looked at us sharply and Curtis moved round in an actual sitting position. "What are you on about?" he asked.

"They're building an environmental monitoring station under the flyover!" Simon elaborated.

"They're building a what?" said Nathan moronically. "That sounds made up, are we supposed to know what that is?"

"It's to measure the carbon monoxide from the flyover! When they dig the foundations they'll find the bodies!" Simon's voice dropped to a whisper.

"Look, what it is isn't important!" I snapped. "What _is_ important is working out what the fuck we're gonna do about it!"

Just then, the roof door open and Alisha sauntered out, looking a bit ruffled. "Hey, the probation worker's looking for all of you. She's spazzing out 'cause you lot are all, like, AWOL." All four of us looked between each other, unsure who should break the news to her. "Why you all acting like retards?"

I sighed. "Alisha, there's something we need to tell you."

* * *

"We need to move them!" Curtis quietly informed us all twenty minutes later as we sat in the main hall sorting through the clothes again.

"Oh, a couple of questions," Nathan whispered, adjusting the sports bra he'd put on over his jumpsuit. "How? Where? _Are you out of your mind?_"

"If we leave them there, they'll find them!" Curtis spat.

"Oh, whereas diggin' 'em up and walkin' around with 'em, that's a real low-risk strategy!" Nathan hissed sarcastically.

"Well what do you suggest we do then, Mr All-Knowing?" I whispered angrily. The two of us had barely spoken today and when we had, we'd been doing nothing but getting irritated with each other, a telltale sign we were both stressed out and both refusing to admit it.

"Well, why doesn't he -" Nathan made whistling noises and twirled his fingers around to indicate going back in time. "And stop us killing the probation worker in the first place?!"

"You show me how it works and I'll do it!" Curtis snapped, clearly irked. There was a slightly awkward silence in which Nathan seemed to actually realise he was wrong for a change.

"Guys. Please stop," I said wearily. "Arguing ain't gonna solve shit, and I'm including myself in that."

"We need a car." Simon brought us straight back to the issue at hand.

"Have you got a car?" Nathan asked him.

Simon shook his head. "No."

"Great, maybe we should call a cab!" Nathan said with disdain. "Better make it a seven-seater!"

"Nathan, what did I just say?" I warned him.

"Didn't realise you were my mum now," he sulked.

"Didn't realise you'd taken extra strength dickhead pills this morning," I shot back.

"Well where's _your_ car then?!" he demanded. "I don't see you rushing to be productive!"

"Oh yeah, because informing everyone that our arses are half a metre of dirt away from a prison cell isn't productive at all!" I said heatedly. "And just FYI, my car's in the garage! It's fucking useless at the moment, kinda like you."

Nathan opened his mouth to protest but was cut off by the front doors opening and Kelly walking in, seriously late, even for a young offender. She looked different to how she usually did. Though she was still wearing pink trackies and a blue shirt, her hair was down, a cap was clamped down on her head and a pair of sunglasses were firmly over her eyes. It was a look that just screamed _hangover from hell_.

"Kelly? Are you alright?" I asked her, concerned.

"'M fine," was her quiet reply.

"Where've you been?" Alisha questioned her.

"Had to go doctor's" she said shadily, adjusting her sunglasses.

"Yeah? Well while you were gettin' your smear test – BIG SHOCK! We found out the bodies are about to be dug up!" Nathan hissed to her.

"They're building an environmental monitoring station under the flyover, right where we buried them, shock horror," I explained tiredly, rubbing at my forehead where I felt a headache coming on in the worst way.

"Sounds like bullshit, right?" said Nathan.

"Can you steal a car?" Alisha asked her abruptly. Curtis turned and asked her the same thing.

"Will ya all fuck off?" Kelly said hotly, storming over to the _SHOES_ table and pushing a load off so she could sit down.

"Alright, touchy," said Nathan. "Come on, look!" He stood up and planted his hands on his hips. "We're a bunch of young offenders and not one of us knows how to steal a car? That is pathetic!"

"Yeah, well to be honest, I've had better things to do with my life than learn how to hotwire a car," I replied coolly, standing up as well and flicking a skirt at him.

Alisha also stood up and butted in with, "Look, I'll borrow my dad's car!" Nathan clicked his fingers and pointed to her in agreement.

"'Cause you're banned from driving, so that makes sense, right?" Curtis said derisively.

"Oh, you're like a whiny little bitch!" Alisha snapped at him. Christ, there must have been something in the water making us all at each others' throats.

"Guys, guys, guys, come on!" Nathan said, clapping at them before moving to stand between them. "We need to work together!" He put an arm around each of their shoulders. "Think of it as a team buildin' exercise, huh? I'm feelin' this! Are we feelin' this?"

"Prick," Alisha spat, jerking away from him. Curtis did the same, angrily throwing the t-shirt he was holding into one of the piles of clothes, leaving Nathan awkwardly standing there.

"You should be one of them motivational speakers," I told him. "You'd make shitloads of cash!"

"Funny thing, I always wanted to do that," he shot back. "By that, I mean makin' shitloads of cash. So Blakey," He draped an arm around my shoulders and gave me a squeeze. "You feelin' the team buildin'?"

I grinned at him, silently cursing my inability to stay angry with him for more than a few hours. "Sure I am, Nate. Let's rock this shit."

* * *

"Right, I'm not being funny," I said much later that evening. "But how the fuck are we all meant to fit in there?" It was half nine at night, and I was staring at the car Alisha had brought for us to move the bodies. It was a five-seater and there were six of us, eight when we got round to unearthing our maggoty friends.

"It'll work," Alisha said confidently. "Somehow. So what are we gonna do with the bodies when we dig them up, anyway?"

"We…weigh 'em down and toss 'em in the lake!" replied Curtis with certainty, handing Alisha a bundle of blankets and rope to put in the boot.

"Yeah, we do that, and you know what happens next week?" said Nathan, chucking in a spade. "The council are all like, 'let's drag the lake'. So predictable."

"Yeah, so we bury them somewhere else," said Alisha, opening the driver's seat door.

"Oh, but enough with the diggin' and the buryin' already!" Nathan whinged.

"You come up with somethin' then!" said Curtis, sounding irritated.

"We boil them in a bath of sulphuric acid, serial killer-style!" he proclaimed.

"Won't work," I said bluntly. "The acid will dissolve the corpses but leaves behind a gunk that still has bits of bone marrow and other DNA in. If someone found it then we'd still get done for a double homicide. Just look at John Haigh. Sure he got away with it for six years but the cops got him eventually." I tapped my nails on the roof of the car as something in my head clicked. "Oi! Where the fuck am I sitting?!" During my murderous monologue, Simon, Curtis and Kelly had all taken the backseat, Nathan shotgun and Alisha obviously driving. Oh this was not gonna be comfortable.

"I fucking hate this," I griped a few minutes later, sat in the footwell of the passenger seat between Nathan's legs. He'd shoved the seat back as far as he could get it – almost crushing Simon's legs in the process – but I was still crunched up with my chin resting on my drawn-up knees.

As usual, no one paid attention to my complaints. "We could store them in the community centre until we decide what to do with them," Simon suggested.

"Oh great, the community centre!" Curtis sneered. "Because they have a special room for storing rotten corpses!"

"Don't be fucking sarcastic, Curtis," I snapped, feeling a weird closeness to Simon after our chat this morning. He was beginning to feel like a real good mate. A twitchy, wide-eyed, real good mate.

"There's a disused storeroom upstairs," Nathan said absent-mindedly. "I've got a key."

My mouth set in an immediate grimace. Oh good one. I wondered if he'd realised he'd just basically revealed he was homeless.

"Why've you got a key?" Kelly asked curiously. To be honest, it was a minor miracle she'd never heard Nathan or me thinking about it.

Silence. A lot of that seemed to be happening over the last few days. But eventually, Nathan spoke, "I nicked 'em because I'm livin' in the community centre, okay! Happy? Big secret revealed!" There was yet another silence in which Nathan let the news of his homelessness sink in to everyone, before he gestured around me at the dashboard. "This is a sweet ride!" Alisha grinned at him and started the engine before pulling away from the community centre.

* * *

Okay, so I now knew how mass murderers in movies felt when they were about to be discovered. Digging is uncomfortable, tiring and messy. By the time we were about three foot into the grave, I was sweaty, exhausted and my jeans were coated in mud. And the smell…urgh, the smell.

Imagine dog shit, dead fish and soured milk all mixed together with a stick wrapped in PE socks that haven't been washed in seven years. That's what it smelt like. It was the officially foulest thing that had ever come into contact with my nostrils. _And_ I'd had to change my little brother's nappy when he had diarrhoea. Not exactly the greatest task for a ten-year-old to do.

"Ah, man! It stinks!" groaned Curtis, pausing his digging and recoiling from the stench, his arm over his nose. "We must be getting close."

"And the prize for the most obvious comment of the night goes to Curtis Donovan!" I said sardonically, leaning on my spade and applauding him. He was about to reply, a narked expression on his face, but was interrupted by Nathan bending over and retching into the half-emptied grave.

"Please don't be sick!" I pleaded. "If you puke, I'll puke! I had lasagne for tea and nobody wants to see that make a reappearance!"

"I'm fine!" he moaned, straightening up and continuing to dig. "I'm fine…" As he thrust his spade back into the dirt, there was this sickening squelchy-crunchy noise…something that vaguely sounded like metal hitting flesh. "I've got somethin'!" He used his spade to dust off whatever it was, and flipped it over. The 'it' in question turned out to be the probation worker's now-severed hand.

"Oops," he said, looking completely grossed out.

My stomach churned violently. "Yep. Here comes the vomit…" I turned away from everyone and was sick quite loudly, but luckily it neatly missed my shoes. There were several noises of disgust around the group, but I didn't really give a fuck. I wiped my mouth on my hoodie sleeve, pulled some gum out of my pocket and popped it in my mouth and looked apologetically at the others. "Sorry about that."

After my little incident, the boys it would be best for me to stand to the side with Alisha and Kelly and hold one of the torches. The boys kept digging…and it seemed like it took forever. But eventually, the bodies of the probation worker and Gary the Gangster were completely unearthed, and the sight of their decomposed corpses very nearly made me puke again.

Thankfully, so I wouldn't have to go anywhere near the bodies, I volunteered for the task of re-filling the grave, and so did Nathan. As Simon, Curtis, Alisha and Kelly all helped wrap the bodies in the blankets, the two of us quietly chucked the dirt back into the hole, the only noise being the scraping of the spades, until Nathan spoke.

"You alright now Blakey?" he asked.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Why?" I frowned.

"Well, I haven't heard you make any sarcastic comments to me or anyone aside from Curtis in the past hour, nor have you hit me. Plus, y'know, the whole -" He mimed me being sick. "I'm worried about ya."

"No. I'm fine. It's just I'm allergic to the smell of decaying corpses," I shot back.

"Seriously?"

"No, not seriously, you twat," I sighed, shaking my head. "What about you? Are you okay?"

"Oh yeah, I'm havin' the time of my fuckin' life. This is totally how I envisioned my community service – buryin' my probation worker."

"I know right? I can guarantee this is the kind of thing that will get me in a dumped in a place like Arkham Asylum," I commented.

"What the fuck you on about?" Nathan raised an eyebrow at me.

"It's the mental asylum in the _Batman _comics. No? You've never heard me mention it before? Seriously? Anyway, that's not important, nor is it what I meant. I mean, in the car, you seemed real bummed out."

"I don't exactly relish in the fact everyone knows I'm homeless," he replied.

"Yeah, I guess so. But maybe it's better that everyone knows?" I said softly. "You don't have to bother lying about it now."

"Yeah, but do we all really need to be that intimate with each other's lives?" he retorted. "No. I don't think so. Not so big on the sharin'! Sometimes I don't even like that you knew." By now we'd finished filling in the grave, and he huffed away in the direction of the car, still carrying the probation worker's detached hand.

"Alright, Mr Sensitive," I called after him, dragging my spade along the floor as I really couldn't be bothered to carry it. "Sorry I mentioned it!" I dumped the spade in the boot and went and sat in the passenger seat of the car next to Alisha.

"You feeling okay now?" she asked me.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Except that I'm now really, really hungry," I answered.

"Good. I don't want puke in my car," she said.

"I thought it was your dad's car?" I joked. Suddenly, something landed on the windscreen with a nauseating splattering sound. "Holy fucker!" It was the probation worker's hand. Ick.

"Jesus!" gasped Alisha.

Nathan appeared in front of the glass and picked up the hand. He waved it at us and shouted, "Sorry!"

"Prick!" I yelled at him, putting my hand on my chest and trying to slow down my heart rate, as it felt like my heart my burst through my torso.

"For fuck's sake," Alisha grumbled, flicking on the ignition. My door suddenly open, causing my heart rate to rocket back up again. "Come on, Blakey, back on the floor," came Nathan's voice.

"Can't you just sit in the back?" I groaned. "I'm comfortable here."

"I called shotgun!" he complained.

"No you didn't!" I affirmed, folding my arms.

"Well, I'm callin' it now," he said. He suddenly lunged and grabbed hold of one of my legs and pulled, trying to physically drag me out of the car.

"Fucking hell, Nathan! Get off me!" I shrieked, gripping onto the seat. At this point my legs were hanging out of the car as he pulled me. My nails were scraping against the nylon seat and I was totally aware of the fact I was losing.

"For fuck's sake, will ya both just get in the fuckin' car!" Kelly exclaimed angrily. In the few seconds I was distracted by her, Nathan managed to yank my leg hard enough that I flew out of the car, landing in a heap just outside the door. He laughed at me and practically jumped over my head to get in the car.

"Oh you really are a jackass, aren't you," I said sourly.

"Don't hate me 'cause you ain't me, B," he smirked, patting his knees. "In you get."

"I hope you choke on that Marmite sandwich I made you," I pouted, reluctantly resuming my crunched up position in the footwell. The sooner we got back to the community centre to stash these rotten fuckers, the better. No crime was worth this amount of pins and needles.

* * *

**A/N – Please review! I loved the feedback on my previous chapter so to beat that would be amazing! Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Seven Playlist  
**_**Here's To Never Growing Up –**_** Avril Lavigne  
**_**The Anthem –**_** Good Charlotte**


	8. Tick Tock, Tick Tock

**A/N – Many, many thanks to Alessandra12, DEcon377, Judging. All Day Every Day and MsDrPotatoPond for your reviews!**

* * *

**Chapter Eight – Tick Tock, Tick Tock**

Have you ever had to carry a decaying corpse into a building without attracting any attention to yourself whatsoever? Well, I'm seriously hoping the answer is no, so I'll tell you what it's like.

Fucking terrifying.

I honest to God thought our cover was going to be blown straight out of the water the second we set foot in the community centre. Even though the building was obviously totally empty, I was convinced someone was going to randomly walk in and catch us. I was so on edge that every time someone made an especially loud footstep, I practically jumped out of my skin. I was not cut out to be a murderer in any way, shape or form.

Kelly and I were carrying one of the corpses (despite my many, _many_ pleas to not go anywhere near them,) me carrying the head and Kelly bringing up the legs. I had my mouth set in a firm line, desperately trying not to breathe too heavily. That fucking smell was gonna follow me, I just knew it. I was going to have to sit fully clothed in the shower for an hour as soon I got home otherwise there'd be no way of getting the stench of decomposing corpse off me.

Simon and Alisha had already dragged the first body into the storeroom, and I was halfway in when Nathan said to Kelly, "I like your cap."

"No!" Kelly shrieked as Nathan pulled her cap off…along with all of her hair. What. The. Fuck.

She attempted to cover her now-bald head with her hands (albeit unsuccessfully) and fled from the room, dropping her end of the corpse. The sudden uneven weight distribution almost sent me toppling over as Alisha, Simon and Curtis came out of the storeroom. Nathan was just standing there, her cap and what I now realised was a wig in his hand with his mouth open.

After Curtis and Simon quickly dragged away and stored that second corpse, the five of us reconvened back outside the storage room, none of us quite sure what in the fuck we'd just witnessed. How the fuck was Kelly _bald_?! Like, 'Murica bald eagle levels of bald?! As bald as a porn star's fanny, Nathan might say. Speaking of Nathan, he was still staring after where Kelly had fled, cap and wig still in his hands.

"Did you know she was bald?" asked Simon.

"'Course not! Twat," Nathan snapped. "Jesus…"

"She looked like an alien," Alisha giggled, not one to care about Kelly's feelings at all.

"Aw, don't be mean," Nathan reprimanded, before snorting with laughter. "She did, didn't she? Like a bald alien."

"Wow, you guys are lovely, aren't you?" I said with a roll of the eyes. "There's obviously something wrong with her. Your hair doesn't just fall out, especially not overnight."

"Pfft, don't be bloody dramatic Blake, it's probably nothin'. Reckon she did a Britney last night and shaved it off herself. But I should probably try and find her. Y'know -" Nathan held up the cap and wig before hurrying after Kelly.

To say the mood became uncomfortable after that would be the understatement of the century. I swear, the atmosphere between Alisha and Curtis was so awkward I could have cut out a chunk of it with a knife, old timey _Scooby-Doo _cartoon style.

"Sooo…" I said, whistling slightly. I looked down at my wrist, pretending to look at the watch I was not wearing, nor did I own. "_Wow_, is that the time? I am so tired, I'm gonna get going. Simon, come on."

"What?" Jesus H. Christ, was he really that slow to catch on?

"You're walking me home," I said firmly.

"Oh, okay," he said warily.

I waved cheerily at Alisha and Curtis. "See you guys tomorrow, then." I turned to Simon and gestured at him to follow me. "Let's go."

As we emerged from the community centre doors into the darkness outside, there was no sign of either Kelly or Nathan. I wondered if he had managed to catch up to her yet. I had a feeling when he did, she'd have a lot of stuff to say to him. And I also had a feeling none of it would be friendly. To be honest, I wouldn't be all that surprised if Nathan was the one sporting the bloody nose tomorrow morning.

Simon and I walked in silence, standing well over a foot apart, neither of us with any idea what to say. What could we say? _Moving the bodies went well, here's to not getting arrested! _I think the fuck not, somehow.

There was a sudden gust of wind that blew my hair around my face, and I could smell the dirty corpse stench on it. Urgh. I felt exhausted and I felt violently ill. I just wanted to go home, curl up in a warm bath and then collapse into bed. Today had been one massive, terrifying, emotionally draining, exhausting pile of wank. I abruptly felt like I was going to cry, tears starting to well up in my eyes. _No, stop it! Stop it! Stop it!_ Despite desperately trying to smother it, a small choking noise escaped my throat. Son of a bitch.

"Are...are you okay?" Simon asked tentatively.

"Yeah. Right as rain. Why wouldn't I be?" My voice cracked slightly under the pressure of suppressed tears.

"Everything that's just happened," he replied. "You've been very quiet, and you were sick. Are you sure everything's okay?"

I sighed. "Honestly? No. I've just had to un-bury two dead bodies and hide them in a community centre storage room. I feel sick, I'm convinced that we're gonna get arrested in the next forty-eight hours and I stink of rotting corpse. I'm scared, Simon. I'm so scared." Unable to control my emotions any further, I threw my arms around his neck and hugged him, beginning to cry properly.

Though hesitant, Simon's arms closed around my waist. It felt nice. I had no idea why I'd just spilled all this to him. I was so used to Nathan and I being wrapped up in our own little bubble – Sherlock and Watson take on the world and all that – that it was like I'd forgotten there were other people I could be friends with. But to be honest with you, at the moment I felt so vulnerable and weak that I just wanted someone to talk to, Nathan wasn't here, and Simon seemed like the only other person in our little ASBO group who wouldn't judge me, like the one person I could truly _trust_ to be a friend.

"We're all scared," he said quietly.

"I can't do this anymore," I mumbled. "I can't. I don't want to."

"None of us do," he replied. I pulled away from him, my face damp with tears, and he looked at me seriously. "But we have to."

* * *

After spending a literal hour sobbing in the shower the second I stepped through my front door, I spent the first half of the night drifting in and out of a fitful, dream-fuelled sleep. Well, I say dream. They were more like nightmares. Zombie probation workers eating my brains were never going to be pleasant thoughts, were they?

By 3AM, I was so sick of tossing and turning that I got up and slumped over to the other side of the flat, collapsing on the sofa with the duvet wrapped tightly around me. Even then I couldn't catch a break as sleep continued to evade me, resulting in me paying far too much attention to SyFy's God awful after midnight 'horror movies.' You thought _Anaconda _was bad, try the direct-to-TV _Anaconda 3: Offspring_ for size.

By the time the sun rose over the estate, I was so exhausted I had a feeling I visually resembled SpongeBob in that episode where he dries out in Sandy's treedome. I was a mess. I didn't even want to leave the pissing flat, but of course I had no choice. Today we were going to find a more permanent place to bury the bodies, because they'd obviously be found if we left them in the storeroom.

A second trip to the bathroom in less than eight hours confirmed my 'looks like a dried up sponge' theory as you could literally count the bags under my eyes and the rings around them were so dark I was honestly debating whether I even needed to bother wearing eyeliner today. No, again, I had to. Pretences needed to be kept up or Sally would know something was wrong. I usually turned up looking like a My Chemical Romance reject, so that's what I'd do today. Grey skinny jeans, My Chem band tee, scuffed up DMs. Sorted.

However, given that my anxiety levels were at an all-time high, I didn't bother eating breakfast. Instead, I just popped my usual morning medication and made myself an extra large, extra strong mug of coffee with about four spoonfuls of sugar. It's good for shock, okay?

Given that my car was still in the garage, I had to take the long route to the community centre again. It didn't bug me as much this morning as I was hoping that I'd be able to catch up with Simon. Sure enough, as I came to the end of the dirt path that lead to the fly-over, there he was. He was standing behind one of the pillars, half-concealed, watching the builders dig what I assumed were the foundations for the environmental monitoring station.

"Hey Simon," I said lightly as I came up behind him, making him jump.

"Oh, hi Blake," he said, smiling at me, a smile that I returned. "How are you feeling today?"

"As alright as I could possibly be at this moment in time. But I'm not dead, so things could be worse," I said, shrugging. "What are you doing, anyway?"

"I was just seeing if the builders had noticed where we dug last night," he answered.

"Oh, right." I peered over at the group of men myself, but I couldn't see anything that would suggest they were doing anything but going about their business as usual. "As much as I feel like a big ball of pessimism this fine morning, I think we might actually be okay on that front. Come on, we should probably get going, otherwise we'll be seriously late."

Simon nodded, and the two of us continued down the track together. It was weird – when we'd first started our community service, Simon and I had said barely two words to each other. Literally. I don't even think I directly spoke to him that first day. Oh no, wait, I think directed a snarky comment at him after the lightning struck. But now, things were different. Ha, different. I could laugh at what an understatement that was. Things were _critical_.

Though I was relatively close to all of the team – and was a surgery away from being Nathan's conjoined twin – Simon had grown on me the most over recent days. I liked Kelly, I liked Alisha, I...tolerated Curtis, but Simon was the first of all of them that I felt I could truly consider a new friend. He was neutral, level-headed, calm, everything I needed to keep my head on straight while we were all going through this. Together.

"I've had an idea," Simon said, jolting me out of my over-sentimental thoughts.

"About what?" I frowned.

"What to do with the bodies," he replied.

"Thank God. Nobody else is gonna be bright enough to think of anything," I said with a laugh. "I was going to suggest feeding them to pigs but hey, I'm open to negotiation. What's your plan?"

"Not here. I'll tell you with the others," he said quickly.

"Oh, so I'm just one of 'the others', am I?" I demanded, attempting a joke, but Simon seemed to panic at my tone.

"No, I didn't mean that," he said, looking worried.

"No no, I get it. It's fine," I said in an overly dramatic voice, placing the back of my hand against my forehead like I was faint. "I thought we were friends, but apparently not."

"We're friends?" Simon asked.

"Of course we're friends," I told him, surprised. "Why wouldn't we be?"

"I don't know. The others don't seem to regard me as one."

"You're...you're not really the kind of person they're used to dealing with," I said gently. "We all come from loud, social backgrounds, and while I have other hobbies like reading, watching rugby or footie and gaming that make me much more accepting of others, they don't. They don't understand weird little nerds like you, and even me to an extent."

"They seem to like you just fine," Simon said resentfully.

"Yeah, well, that's because I have literally no emotion. I don't care what people say to me and I give as good as I get."

"I can't do that, though. I'm not loud and obnoxious, and I don't like being looked at all the time."

"Hey! Who are you calling obnoxious?" I said indignantly. "I'll just pretend you didn't say that. Now, I'd like to say we should try and get you to be a bit louder and a bit more noticeable, but I think it'd be weird if we did. This caring, quiet, shy boy is who you are, and you should never have to change that."

* * *

The sentimentality of the morning was completely shattered by Kelly and Nathan. Simon and I were sitting in the locker rooms after getting changed into our jumpsuits when they burst into the room, Kelly practically spitting with fury.

"Yep, it was her ex-boyfriend and he's bald!" she growled. "It's Jodi! She's got this power or somethin'! Urgh! That bitch did this to me!" She slammed back against the lockers, folding her arms with a huff.

"So she has the power to turn people _bald_?" Nathan repeated incredulously. "That is rubbish! Bald, bald, bald…" he pointed at each me, Simon and Kelly, though he faltered at that last one.

"When I catch her, I'm gonna batter her! I'm gonna rip her tits off!" Kelly yelled viciously.

"May I suggest the titty twister for that one?" I offered. "Y'know, grab the nipple, twist and pull?"

"I thought your forte for revenge usually involved bowling balls," Nathan snorted.

I grinned at him. "Very true, but I feel that this particular brand of revenge requires more theatrics. The titty twister never fails. Remember that time I tried it on Scott because he dared me to?"

Nathan's snort became full-blown laughter. "Oh my God, that was fuckin' classic! I have never heard a bloke scream like that. Actually, come to think of it, I've never seen a bloke's nipples turn that purple either."

"What's more important is that through the art of Facebook, we can make sure the entire world knows just how purple a man's nips can be," I said reminiscently.

Kelly and Simon stared at us both, completely dumbfounded by the conversation they'd just heard. On the plus side, at least Kelly seemed to have calmed down now. "Yous two are fuckin' mental. Ya know that?"

"We've been told," Nathan smirked, flinging an arm around my shoulders.

"Right, come on!" Sally's bossy voice suddenly travelled through the locker room door. "All of you in the main hall, now!"

"D'you think we should wait for Curtis and Alisha?" I said, standing up and stretching.

"Nah, they're probably shaggin' or somethin'," Nathan said dismissively.

"Urgh, changed my mind," I gagged. "I ain't hanging around to see Curtis' post-cum face if it's as ugly as his 'Wanna smash?' face. Nope. I'm out."

"Your bitchiness never fails to astound me," Nathan said as the four of us followed Sally's command and reported for duty in the main hall. Nice to see the cow hadn't even stuck around to give us instructions on what the fuck we were doing. Instead, we found ourselves surrounded by sealed cardboard boxes full of the clothes we'd been sorting the last two days.

"Well this looks like it's gonna be some bullshit," I grumbled, sitting on one of the sealed boxes of clothes and nearly falling straight through when the cardboard collapsed. "Shit!" Simon caught hold of one of my hands and pulled me up before the box completely caved in. "Cheers Simon."

"You're welcome." He seemed to pause, watching Nathan flit around the room, dancing in and out of the box towers whilst singing _Another One Bites The Dust_. "How do you do it?"

I frowned. "Do what?"

"Stay so close with Nathan? You're both so different."

I actually laughed, following Nathan with my eyes and smiling at his hyperactivity. "No we're not. Not really. Just because I can pay an ounce of attention to people's feelings doesn't mean we're different. Nathan is like my un-twin. The cheese to my onion, the gin to my tonic, the jam to my doughnut. Then there's the fact he literally saved my life last year, although to be honest, if I hadn't sacked him off by that point then there's no way I'd bother to now."

Now it was Simon's turn to frown. "He saved your life?"

I waved a dismissive hand. "God, that is so not something I wanna talk about right now. It's a story for another time."

"Alright lads." Nathan's boisterous voice cut between the two of us like the swing of an axe. "What are we talkin' about here, then?" He popped up in front of us like a jack-in-the-box, clearly bored of performing his one man show.

"My period," I said sweetly, causing Nathan to clam up like a bit of seafood.

Just then, the doors opened and Curtis and Alisha walked in dressed in their jumpsuits, apparently having finally decided to show up. I let out a low whistle to capture everyone's attention and gestured with my hands for them to join us. Everyone not already here gathered around the box Simon and I were standing by.

"Okay, shitheads, listen up," I announced, clapping my hands at them. "Our good friend Simon here -" I threw an arm around his shoulders. "- has had an idea about what to do with our little _problems_ upstairs. I'd like to tell you what it is, but since he hasn't actually told me yet, I'll just let him to the explaining." I gave him a meaningful look.

"We should bury the bodies underneath the foundations of the environmental monitoring station before they pour in the concrete," he said quietly.

"So your plan is – we dig up the bodies, and then we rebury them in exactly the same place? You're a genius!" Nathan hissed derisively.

"Right, seriously Nathan, what have I said about constantly being a prick?" I warned him. "Simon, I gotta tell you, that's actually a fucking brilliant idea."

"That works!" Curtis said through a smile.

"Yeah, that's dead smart," agreed Kelly. Simon looked adorably proud of himself, giving everyone a cute little smile that made him look like a cold-eyed puppy.

"...Pfft. It's okay," said Nathan superficially. As usual, I just rolled my eyes.

Charity Guy suddenly appeared out of nowhere, carrying one of the cardboard boxes. "Okay guys, if you wanna grab a box and follow me." None of us really moved except for Alisha, who turned her back slightly on him. His ridiculously cheery smile wavered slightly. "Guys? Do you wanna…grab a box?" We all sighed and each reluctantly grabbed a box, and this was how the rest of the day was spent- packing up boxes and stacking them- until we were finally set free at the end of the day.

"Right. Let's get this shit over and done with," I proclaimed in the locker room. There was a pause. "How exactly are we getting this shit over and done with?"

"I'll go ask Alisha if we can borrow her dad's car again," said Curtis. "We can use that to drive the bodies up to the fly-over. Unless yours is sorted?" Was it me, or did I detect a note of hope in that last sentence? He and Alisha hadn't said a single word to each other today so I was surprised he'd even offered to do this. Something was seriously up with the two of them.

I shook my head. "Nope, sorry bro. I'm not picking it up till tomorrow night at the earliest. Alisha's our only bet. You might wanna hurry, she buggered off as soon as she'd changed." I gestured with my hands at the door. Curtis nodded and left.

I was beyond praying that he would be able to persuade her to let us use the car again. There was no other way we could transport two decomposed bodies halfway across the estate without being seen. However, that praying was in vain because when Simon, Nathan, Kelly and I turned the corner that lead to the community centre courtyard, Alisha was disappearing with Charity Guy, leaving a very pissed off Curtis in her wake.

"Where's she goin'?!" Nathan demanded.

I pretended to sniff the air. "Ah yes, anyone else sensing the distinct aroma of 'hook up?'" I said, watching Alisha and the guy disappear around the corner.

"Urgh, d'you mean she's hookin' up with _him_?" Kelly exclaimed in disbelief.

"Oh, that is _definitely_ on," Nathan agreed.

"How do we move the bodies without her dad's car?" asked Simon, ever the practical thinker.

"You need to get that tart on the phone, and tell her we need her dad's car to shift the stiffs!" Nathan directed at Curtis, who had already started walking away in the same direction Alisha and Charity Guy had gone.

"Er, where ya goin'? We need to move the bodies!" hissed Kelly.

"You deal with it!" he snapped.

"Cunt!" I shouted after him, earning me a three separate looks of surprise from the others. "Oh come on. You were all thinking it!" I said defensively.

"We can take Sally's car," suggested Simon.

"Yeah, good plan." I nodded, feeling somewhat faint at the idea of this going so tits up so quickly.

"Who's Sally?" Nathan stupidly questioned with a frown.

"Oh, for fuck's sake," I said, facepalming, while Kelly and Simon looked at him like he was mentally devoid of any brain cells. "The probation worker, you complete and utter moron!"

* * *

It took us another ten minutes to sort that out, though for all intents and purposes, we had managed to come up with a half-decent plan. Simon turned himself invisible to get the keys from Sally's bag, and we managed to get the bodies out of the storeroom, past the probation office and out to the car park without any hiccups and without getting noticed.

Kelly, Simon and I lifted the first body (Gary) into the boot of Sally's car with no trouble as the corpse was kinda small, but it was the probation worker corpse that started causing problems as it was too big for the three of us to handle.

I say three and not four because one of us – no prizes for guessing who – had not lifted a finger since we dragged both bodies out of the building. Nathan seemed to think he was above wrestling with dead people, as he sat in the driver's seat checking himself out in the wing mirror. Not once had he offered to give us even an inkling of assistance. Enough was enough, in my eyes.

"Oi! Twat! Get out of the frigging car and come give us a hand!" I spat at him, as me, Simon and Kelly desperately tried to force the body into the boot.

"I'm the designated driver!" he retorted.

"Designated dickhead, more like," I snapped back.

"Help us, you prick!" hissed Kelly.

He sighed and got out of the car. "Which one's this?" he grunted, pushing at the body.

"The probation worker," replied Simon.

"He's a fat bastard," panted Nathan as he pushed, and we eventually managed to get the body to fit. As Kelly slammed the boot shut, Sally emerged from the building, checking something on her phone.

"Fuck!" I all but shrieked.

"Shit!" exclaimed Nathan, grabbing my hand and pulling me down behind the car. Kelly and Simon both scrambled to hide as well.

"Fuckfuckfuckfuck!" I muttered. "We need to move. Now!" As Sally rummaged in her bag for something – probably her missing car keys – the four of us managed to crawl over to a gathering of big metal barrels and dumpsters which were giving off an appalling smell and hid behind them. Just in time too, as Sally hurried around to the side of the car we had been squatting behind not one minute earlier.

"You're the one with the big ideas!" Nathan hissed at Simon. "What do we do?!" Even Simon faltered at this one.

As she opened the driver's door, I whispered to the others, "It'll be okay. She won't be able to start the car because we have the keys. She buggers off, we get in the car and skirt outta here."

"Er…" Nathan said guiltily.

"Nathan?" I said suspiciously, narrowing my eyes. "What have you done?" Before he could even open his mouth to reply, my question was answered as the car's engine started and Sally drove away, leaving us behind in a puff of dust.

"No! NO! NO!" I howled like a rabid dog, running out from behind the dumpster, closely followed by Nathan.

"Shit!" he yelled.

"You prick!" I screamed at him, slapping him on the arm repeatedly. "You absolute twat-headed cunt-face! You left the keys in the fucking ignition!"

"Ow! Ow! Stop hittin' me! I forgot, I'm sorry!" he cried, stepping away from me. "How was I supposed to know she was gonna come out here and just drive off?"

"Anyone with half a fucking brain would have some clue that it was a possibility!" I seethed at him as me, him, Simon and Kelly headed up to the roof of the community centre. "Then again, I guess that's why you didn't think of it, because you clearly have no brain! How could you have fucking done this to us?! We are D-O-N-E, fucked!"

"Are you PMSing?" he seriously asked me.

"NATHAN!" I punched his arm again as we emerged on to the roof. "Instead of being a useless dick, why don't you make yourself half-useful and call Curtis to explain this lovely situation you've gotten us in? Now!"

"Alright, alright, pushy," he muttered. He pulled his phone out of his pocket and moved as far away from me as possible, which meant standing at the edge of the roof. I collapsed onto the end of the lounger next to Kelly and ran my hands through my hair. I'm amazed it wasn't falling out like Kelly's had, I was feeling so stressed.

My anxiety hadn't flared up like this in a long, long time. My stomach was churning away to the point where it actually hurt. I had a headache. I kept biting my lips so violently I had drawn blood. Worst of all, I felt completely and utterly isolated. I was watching Nathan make that phone call and all I felt like doing was shoving him off the side building onto those metal spikes below just for putting us into this situation in the first place. How sick was that?

I felt movement beside me and out of the corner of my eye I saw Simon move to beside me. "Are you okay?" His voice was so quiet and concerned, it just pissed me off more. I wasn't a goddamn charity case.

"Don't ask stupid questions, Simon. Of course I'm not," I said waspishly. His face fell and I automatically felt absolutely bloody terrible. "I'm sorry, Simon. I didn't mean to sound like a bitch. I'm not good at dealing with these sort of situations. Stress isn't...good for me."

He placed his hand on my shoulder. "This will all work out. Nothing bad will happen to you." I turned my head and gave him a small smile. Thank God for Simon and his calming aura. Maybe it was a good thing my engine had packed up; if I hadn't taken that walk to work yesterday, I didn't know if Simon would have been this comfortable with me or my mood swings.

"-worker is drivin' around with the stiffs in the boot of her car," Nathan was saying into his phone. "Just thought you'd wanna know. Anyway…call me." He hung up and looked up at us. "I left a message." He decided it would be a good idea to come and sit in between Kelly and me. "I guess that's it. We're goin' to prison."

"Yeah, my career's teacher said that's where I'd end up," Kelly said bitterly. "She'll be givin' it all this." She made a talking gesture with her hand.

"Yeah, well you'll do alright in prison. You've got the whole bald thing, you're well butch," Nathan said, earning himself a punch from Kelly. "Ow! You know, you hit me a lot!" he cried resentfully.

"Yeah because you're a dick!" Kelly snarled.

"Why you stressin'?!" Nathan was almost deliriously clueless sometimes "I'm the one with the problem! The freaks in them prisons probably haven't seen a beautiful face in fuck knows how long. Those places are full of perverts and rapists. My anal virginity will only last so long! As for Blake...she's like the police sketch of every serial killer victim ever. We'll find her chopped up in the chilli within a week."

Now it was my turn to slap Nathan upside the head. "Can you not?! I already feel like I'm about to spray chunks all over the concrete!"

"Maybe Sally won't look in the boot," Simon interjected.

"Oh, fingers crossed, eh?" Nathan said mockingly.

"I hate to say it, Si, but he's kinda got a point," I said gloomily. "We're just not that lucky." Simon sat down next to me and put his head in his hands in despair. Now it was my turn to do the comforting. I scooched a little bit closer to him and placed my hand in the crook of his elbow. He turned to me, and while I couldn't smile, I did raise the corner of my mouth in an attempt at one. It was a look that told him we'd be in this together, not matter what. It was a look that I meant.

* * *

I ended up sleeping at the community centre with Nathan that night. I couldn't the stomach the idea of another night alone. Well, I say sleeping. I'd managed to catch maybe twenty minutes of uninterrupted snooze. Nathan, as usual, had slept through the entire night as I sat in the pitch dark leaning against the wall, legs drawn up to my chest. I'd woken him up at the arse crack of dawn just for the company. Simon had turned up not too soon after.

I was scared shitless. I was dressed in yesterday's gross clothes. I was shaking like a leaf and I was so pale with fear I was practically translucent. Today was the day our fates would be decided. Time was not on our side.

"We're fucked. We're going to prison. We're so dead. We're fucked. We're going to prison, we're so dead," I chanted, pacing round and round in a circle in the middle of the main hall. "We're fucked. We're going to prison. We're so dead. We're fucked. We're going to prison, we're so dead. We're fuc-"

"Blakey. Please shut the fuck up. I love ya, but you're doin' my fuckin' nut in," Nathan begged me, giving me a small shake.

"I'm sorry. I'm trying, I really am, but I am fucking freaked!" I cried out. "We're fucked. We're going to prison. We're so dead…" I couldn't keep still. If I wasn't pacing, I was tapping my foot or clicking my fingers. I was driving myself crazy as well as Nathan, and I was probably annoying Simon too, even though he didn't say anything from his position by the front door.

There was a knock at the other door, and in the state I'd wound myself into I somehow managed to both scream _and_ throw up in my mouth. I felt insanely stupid when I saw it was just Kelly, Alisha and Curtis standing at the glass.

"Calm down!" Nathan hissed at me, opening the door. As the three of them walked inside, he asked them, "Did any of you get any sleep last night?"

"No," Curtis replied seriously.

"We would have been arrested by now if she'd found the bodies," said Alisha as the six of us formed a circle in the middle of the room.

"Maybe they're waiting until we're all together," Simon said intensely.

"Now why would you say somethin' like that?" exclaimed Nathan, sounding slightly hysterical.

"What time does she usually get here?" asked Kelly.

"About eight o'clock," answered Nathan.

I pulled out my phone and looked at the time. "It's seven forty-three. We should get outside and wait for her to arrive. That way, we can make sure she doesn't go _anywhere_ near that fucking boot. Agreed?"

Everyone nodded, and we practically sprinted out to the car park. I looked around for somewhere for us to all hide, and we had to settle for behind the dumpsters again. I was squatting in between Kelly and Nathan, my legs shaking underneath me. It seemed like that sour bin smell had intensified over night.

We waited there for fifteen minutes, and all the while my heart was pounding so hard it felt like it was going to rip its way out of my chest. But eventually, Sally's car swung around the corner and slowed to a stop.

"Oh thank fuck!" I breathed. "She hasn't looked in the boot! We're safe!"

"We're gonna be okay! We're not going to prison!" Nathan whispered ecstatically. He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me into a tight hug. I noticed that due to the varying heights we'd both squatted down at, Nathan's head was resting in between my boobs, but I was so frickin' relieved I honestly didn't care as I enclosed my arms around his neck and shoulders and returned the hug, even going as far as to kiss the top of his head.

That feeling of euphoria was abruptly destroyed as Curtis suddenly rounded on us and hissed urgently, "She's gonna get out of the car, she's gonna walk to the boot and she's gonna find the bodies!"

"How do _you_ know?!" demanded Alisha.

"It's already happened once!"

"So _now_ you rewind time!" said Nathan, looking at me with raised eyebrows. I just shrugged, though the rapidly-returning fear in my chest cause me to clutch onto him somewhat tighter. However, by this point in time, Sally had gotten out of the car and was walking towards the boot. I swear to God, if I was sick again...

"What are we gonna do?!" I hissed in dismay.

"Argh! Get the bodies!" Nathan ordered, shoving me off him before grabbing a large chunk of brick off the floor and rapidly emerging from our hiding space.

"What is he thinking?!" I whisper-shrieked. Without any form of hesitation whatsoever, Nathan flexed his arm and chucked the brick at the car windscreen. It smacked straight into the middle of the glass, causing it to splinter out right to the edges with a devastating shattering noise. My eyes widened in sheer disbelief. That didn't just happen. He did not just wreck that fucking car!

Sally whirled round in what I could only describe as sheer disbelief. "What the hell are you doing?!"

"It's just…pure, mindless vandalism!" he stuttered, trying to sound cocky.

"What is the matter with you?" she demanded furiously. "Are you mentally deficient!?"

_Probably_, I thought, causing Kelly, who must have been listening to my thoughts, to splutter with suppressed laughter.

"If I was mentally deficient, I woulda missed. Check that out." Nathan had now reached complete cockiness, pointing to the shattered windscreen with pride. "Bull's-eye!"

"My office, now!" Sally commanded him, sounding completely and utterly enraged. "NOW!"

Nathan started at the shout, but allowed himself to be herded into the community centre by Sally who was hot on his heels. We all jumped out from behind the dumpsters and piled into the car, me driving. Thank God Sally left the keys in the ignition. I did have to kick a small hole in the windscreen to be able to see, but that was beside the point.

We were able to quickly rebury the bodies while the builders were on a break, but we hung back and waited behind one of the pillars to watch them pour in the concrete. Never in my life had I been so grateful to watch vats of lumpy grey liquid be poured into a mud hole.

I felt so bad for Nathan though. I couldn't believe he'd sacrificed himself (sort of) to let us get away. This was one of those times where the serious part of his brain could kick into gear. I inwardly sighed. I owed him an apology for my behaviour over the last couple of days. None of this had really been his fault. If he could suck up his pride and apologise to me after his behaviour during the Ruth thing, then I could apologise for this.

Sherlock and Watson had some serious friendship therapy to get through. But first, he had to deal with Depression Cloud Sally and her lecture on why he probably shouldn't go around hurling bricks at probation workers' cars.

* * *

**A/N – Wow, thank you **_**so much**_** for the feedback on my previous chapter! Y'all rock, seriously. Please keep this up, you have no idea how validated you're making me feel! I'd love to know what you think about Blake's growing relationship with Simon, and what you think might happen next. Big love to all! Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Eight Playlist  
**_**Doomed –**_** Bring Me The Horizon  
**_**Breaking Down –**_** I Prevail**


	9. Broken Hearts Club

**A/N – Many thanks to Judging. All Day Every Day and MsDrPotatoPond for your absolutely lovely reviews! I always appreciate the continued support from the both of you, it means so much. I'm moving away from canon mostly for this chapter, so I really hope you enjoy!**

* * *

**Chapter Nine – Broken Hearts Club**

We'd done it. I couldn't believe it. We'd done it. We'd gotten away with it. We were free, we weren't going to prison. I could breathe – and sleep – a hell of a lot easier. What's more, knowing that you're not about to be hauled off to the nearest HMP does _wonders_ for the mood. A weight had been lifted from my shoulders, and all in all, I felt pretty mellow for the rest of the day. We'd managed to permanently get rid of the bodies, and hell, it was now only ten o'clock. The rest of the day after that seemed so mundane: finishing packing up the remaining clothes for the Africans, sticking mailing labels on said boxes, and saying sayonara to that fucking annoying Charity Guy.

As soon as we were officially off the clock, we all headed up to the roof, which seemed to slowly be turning into the routine for the end of the day. I curled up in Nathan's lap as we sat one of the chairs and lit a cigarette, enjoying the feeling of the late June sunshine on my face and listening to the various sirens in the distance. The soundtrack to South London living.

"It doesn't matter who's after us now," Kelly said blissfully. "They'll never find the bodies. See ya." She added a jovial little wave.

"It's finally over," I said happily, flicking some ash off my cigarette before taking another deep drag.

"They're going to think the probation worker's still alive," piped up Simon. "I stole his credit card. I used it to book a flight."

"Damn, boy. When'd you get so freaking good at this sorta thing?" I said appreciatively.

"That is smart," said Curtis approvingly, grinning at him.

"Yeah, you're dead good at stuff like that," added Kelly.

"Yeah, nice one, Weird Kid," even Nathan praised him. Simon smiled around the group, looking pleased with himself.

"I cannot _believe_ we got away with this shit!" proclaimed Alisha.

"We should all go out for a drink!" Simon said excitedly. "You know, to celebrate!" Oh no. I could tell he was about to go into some adrenaline induced, excitable meltdown. _No, no, bad call!_ "It's like an ironic 'fuck you' to the probation worker!" he continued, standing up. "We're all out having a good time – you're buried under the foundations of an environmental monitoring station!" He looked around at us eagerly, but his smile was quickly fading as he saw everyone's varying looks of uninterested-ness.

"See you all tomorrow, yeah?" said Alisha, pushing herself off of the chair she was sitting in and starting to walk away.

As she was making her way to the door, she paused for a minute and shot Curtis a very suggestive look, causing him to immediately leap up with a hurried, "Later!" The two of them disappeared through the door and I couldn't help but shake my head. First they were on, then they were off, then they were _really_ off, and now they were clearly back on again. I was giving myself emotional whiplash just trying to keep up with them. David and Victoria Beckham, they were not.

Next to start leaving was Nathan, who tapped me on the shoulder and said, "Come on, move your fat arse, Blakey."

"You really know how to make a girl feel special, Nate," I mocked, reluctantly moving to my feet. As usual, he just smirked at me before pushing himself up from the chair with a groan.

"Do you want to come for a drink?" Simon asked as Nathan passed him.

"Are you askin' me out on a date?" Nathan demanded.

"No. I meant all of us," said Simon, stuttering slightly.

"Did you?" Nathan leaned closer to Simon and jabbed his finger at him. "I am not your whore!"

As Nathan walked away, Kelly looked at Simon apologetically and said, "There's no way I'm goin' out till me hair grows back. Sorry."

As the stairwell door slammed shut for the third time, it was just me and Simon left on the roof. His giddiness seemed to have subsided somewhat, and he seemed slightly deflated. I moved to stand beside him, stretched and grinned at him to make him feel better.

"Okay, I'll see you at seven then, yeah?" I told him.

"What do you mean?" Not quick on the uptake at all, this one.

I heaved a mock sigh. "Oh dear. Well, you want to go for a drink, and there is no fucking way I'm setting foot in any form of bar or pub wearing this piece of shit-" I plucked at the leg of my jumpsuit. "So I'm gonna need a couple of hours to get ready. Therefore, I'm expecting you outside my house at seven tonight. Comprendé?"

"Oh. Right, okay. S-sure. Where…where do you live?" he asked hesitantly.

"I'm in the middle of the estate. It's Flat Five down D Block. Newport Road," I explained. As I opened the roof door, I turned to him and warned, "By the way, if you're late, I might have to kill you." I shot him a cheeky smile to show him I was joking before heading down the stairs.

"Blakey! Yo, Blakey!" Nathan shouted at me as he paused his daily assault of the vending machine. "You hangin' around tonight? I found where the bar staff hide the Grey Goose, we can get proper shitfaced!" He kicked the machine again for good measure. "Fuck, that bag of Wotsits is tauntin' me."

I shook my head. "Sorry babe, things to do, places to be." I skipped over to him and shoved two quid in the machine. "There. Get yourself a chocolate bar as well."

* * *

I'd forgotten how to go out. I'd forgotten how to have friends. That was the only explanation as to why I was stood here staring into my dresser with no fucking idea what I was supposed to wear. Being realistic, Simon and I were gonna stick out like sore thumbs, we would be the most mismatched pair in any pub on the estate. He looked like a preacher's son; I looked like I needed an exorcism.

I mean, I wasn't exactly about to get dressed up. Yes, it was only the two of us since everyone else had bailed, but this was not and never would be a date. Oh God, what if Simon thought this was a date?! He had a habit of letting small acts of kindness run away with him. Hell, it was how I'd ended up agreeing to this in the first place. What if he'd got the wrong end of the stick?

I didn't want to upset him if he did think that. He was such a sweetheart, and I was sure that one day he'd make a special lady very happy. I was not that lady. I would never be that lady. I wasn't actually sure I'd be anyone's lady anymore. Some days at the moment it felt like even my relationship with Nathan was hanging by a thread, which was a tad counterproductive when all part of me wanted to do was grab him by the shoulders and kiss him like my life depended on it. Of course, I'd never do that. I couldn't ruin a seventeen-year friendship over feelings I was half-sure had only developed since the lightning. Near-death experiences will do that to a chick.

I was overthinking this. Of course Simon wouldn't think this was a date, how bloody conceited could I be. It would be a drink, maybe two, at the nearest pub we could find within walking distance. I certainly wouldn't be getting drunk. I wasn't really supposed to drink alcohol as it was, what with my meds and all that, although I'd be the first to admit that I hadn't stuck to that rule all that well. And by 'all that well,' I meant at all.

However, my scrambled thoughts on alcohol weren't at all helping with my current predicament. Part of me seriously considered if I even needed to get changed. Nah, that wouldn't work. If I turned up looking like I did now – wet hair wrapped in a towel, no make-up, trackies and an old t-shirt – Simon would take one look at me and run screaming in the opposite direction.

"Why am I putting so much effort into this?" I huffed, eventually just reaching into the dresser and grabbing a pair of jeans and a black cross-over top. It would do. Sitting down on my bed, I plugged in my hairdryer and cracked on with making myself look half-presentable. Mama didn't raise no scruffy bitch.

* * *

Quarter to seven rolled around and I was stood in the bathroom finishing up my makeup. The doorbell rang, and as I assumed it was Simon being his usual punctual self, I just called out, "Door's open! Won't be a sec!" and quickly shut the bathroom door so I could do a last minute wee. I heard the door open and shut, then a few footsteps go into the living room. Finishing up on the loo, I smiled at my reflection and headed into the main flat. "Hey, Sim- _Julian_!?" There, sitting on my sofa looking like he'd made himself right at home, was my psycho ex-boyfriend. "What the _fuck_ are you doing here?"

"Well Princess," he drawled, crossing one leg over the other. "Since you've insisted on ignoring all of my texts and calls, I decided I might need to pop round to see you myself."

I folded my arms. "Did it not occur to you that, oh I don't know, I was ignoring you for a fucking reason?" Over the last week, Julian's texts had become incessant. It had began with the ones he sent the day Sally started, just a few days into the shitshow of community service. He'd been quiet for a week or so after that, but then he popped back up like a boomerang I just could not get rid of. I'd ignored him because frankly, I had a lot more important shit to be dealing with like, ya know, burying my probation worker.

He grinned at me, still lounging back on the sofa. "Come on B, don't be like this. I know you've missed me really. Come and give us a little kiss." He turned his head to the side and tapped his cheek with his finger.

"Cunt!" Repeating the same action from the night we split up, I hoicked a mouthful of spit onto his cheek instead.

"Still so ladylike," he said with snort, pulling his hoodie sleeve over his hand and using it to wipe his face. Still, it was enough to finally make him stand up. The me from last year would have immediately shrank back in fear; the me from now stood chest-to-chest with him, my neck craned back so I could look him dead in the eye.

"Yeah well, don't really have a lot of reasons to be a lady, do I?" I snapped. "Seriously Julian, what are you doing here? I don't have time for this bullshit, I've got stuff to be getting on with."

"Oh yeah? Is that why you're dressed half-presentably for a change? Going out? Got yourself a nice new delinquent boyfriend?" he sneered. "Wait, I know. You're finally fucking that prick of a best mate of yours, aren't you?"

"Even if I was fucking Nathan – which I'm not – it wouldn't be any of your fucking business," I retorted. "How's things going with Rhea, by the way?" I named his girlfriend of three months. "Doubt she'd be happy to know your still so hung up on your ex." I wanted nothing to do with him, but Facebook was bloody ceaseless in reminding me of Julian's personal life at least twice a week.

"We split up," he replied, not sounding at all cut up about it in the slightest.

"That's too bad." My tone was cold.

He shrugged. "I wasn't that bothered. Girls like her always do my head in. She was always saying yes, agreed with everything I said, had no thoughts for herself." He grinned wickedly at me. "I like my girls with a little more fight in them."

I rolled my eyes heavily. "Now I know you ain't talking about me, dickhead."

Julian reached out and tried to take my hand, which I promptly snatched back. "Come on, Blake, don't be like that. We were good together, you know we were."

"You know, you're right. We _were_ good together," I agreed sarcastically. "For about...six months. Then you decided you didn't want me to be a girlfriend, you wanted me to be a toy. I'm amazed yes-girl Rhea wasn't your perfect woman."

"I loved you, Blake," he said lowly. "I did fucking _everything_ for you, you ungrateful bitch. Nothing was too much, I gave you anything!"

"Is that what love is to you, Julian?" I demanded, starting to get wound up. "Toss a shitload of cash at your girlfriend and just fuck her feelings?"

"You never fucking listen, do you?" he snarled. "You never could when we were together and you clearly can't now."

"Why the fuck would I ever want to listen to a word you say ever again?!"

"I highly recommend you listen to what I have to say now, Princess, if you want your pathetic little life to mean anything."

"Yeah, alright, because threatening me is really the way to get me to listen." I narrowed my eyes at him. "Fucking spit it out then."

"I want you back!" Julian yelled, his self-control crumbling as he seized hold of my shoulders and violently shook me. It was probably supposed to hurt, but of course, all I could feel was the sensation of pressure on my skin. "Stop being such a fucking stubborn cow and come back to me!"

"You broke my jaw, you fucking psychopath!" I shouted, batting his hands off me and stepping back out of his reach. "You ruined me, arsehole! You gave me pure hell on Earth and said to fucking work with it! Why the _fuck_ would you be so delusional to think I would _ever_ want to be with you again?!"

He chuckled darkly. "I'm signing with a new club. I'm leaving the Wolves at the end of the 2010 season and going to London Wasps. I want you to come with me, bumblebee. You always were my little good luck charm on the pitch."

Now it was my turn to laugh, the sound loud and bitter. "You're so full of shit, it's actually funny. You want _me_ to come with you? Let me think about that for a hot second...um...no. Y'know, I'm actually happy for you, Jules. You getting signed to Wasps means you'll be the other side of the fucking city and far, far away from me."

Julian smiled at me, but it was not a happy smile. It was a manipulative, almost evil smile. "You don't get it, do you, Blake? I'm not giving you a choice here. You _are _going to come with me."

My hand flew out and connected with Julian's face, the sound of the backhand snapping through the little flat. "Don't you dare. Don't you fucking dare think you can talk to me like that now. I'm nothing to do with you anymore, Julian, get that into your thick, 'roided-up brain. I think you forget that I'm not that stupid, terrified, beaten little girl who fell in love with you years ago. You made sure of that. The only thing I have to thank you for after wasting two and a half years of my life on you is that I finally grew a fucking spine. The day I woke up in hospital after trying to kill myself – because of _you_ – was the day I decided not to let any fuckrag stand in my way or hurt me ever again." I held my arms out, presenting the new and improved Blake Harper in all her glory. "You did this to me, Jules. You only have your fist to blame."

He let out a low, dark chuckle. "I tried to be nice, Princess. I tried to let you make this decision yourself. I really didn't want to have to do this, but you're leaving me no choice." Out of nowhere, his arm shot out and I had no time to react or pull back.

He grabbed my hand and squeezed. Of course it didn't hurt, but I could feel something, something so bizarre and out of place that I don't even know how to put it into words. The second his hand locked around mine, I could feel...pulses? No, that's not the right word..._waves_. Invisible, forceful waves making their way inside me, like a chill to the bone. "Julian, wha-"

"_Come with me, Blake._" His voice sounded so distant. I was looking straight at him, but his features began to blur, almost smear away like someone had spilt water on a watercolour. My head tilted to the side, feeling weighted under a fog that thickened with every word Julian spoke. "_Be with me. Come with me. Be my bumblebee..._"

_No! _I wanted to scream. _No, no, no! _But I couldn't. My head was yelling every obscenity I could think of, but my mouth...I couldn't explain it. I felt compelled to do exactly what he said. "Julian..." Was that my voice? I couldn't tell. The fog was becoming heavier, my smeary vision becoming darkness. Soon...soon I would see nothing. "Yes...yes, I will c-"

There was a sudden loud knock at the door, making us both jump and causing Julian to drop my hand. The blurriness abruptly snapped back, my vision righting itself again. My head cleared, whatever fog Julian's words had caused lifting instantly. My eyes flew open, my face contorting into a murderous glare. I must have looked terrifying, as even Julian – huge, hulking great rugby centre Julian Quinn – backed up about three foot away from me.

"Blake-"

"What the fuck was that?" I whispered dangerously. It was impossible. Julian couldn't have a power as well, he just couldn't...there was no way…

"Blake, hold on." Julian reached for my hand again but I was quicker, shoving my hands into his chest and pushing him away from me.

"GET OUT!" I screeched. "GET OUT! FUCK OFF AND GET OUT!"

Julian recovered enough from his initial shock to shoot me that absolutely infuriating smirk of his. "Babydoll suddenly having second thoughts? I heard you, Blake, you were gonna say yes."

"That wasn't me!" I yelled, shoving him again, this time towards the door. "I don't know who the fuck you think you are, but that _bullshit _won't work on me!"

"Give it time, bumblebee," he jeered, walking off on his own accord, though I followed him to make sure he got the fuck out of my flat. "You know I always get what I want."

"Yeah? Not this time," I spat through gritted teeth. I flung the door open and shoved him for a third time, causing him to knock clean into Simon, who had been standing outside the door this whole time, apparently. "Get the fuck away from me, you disgusting cretin!"

Straightening his hoodie, Julian raked his eyes up and down Simon before scoffing. "Is this him? That new delinquent boyfriend? Wow, Blake. Just like I thought, you'll never do better than me. See you around, Princess."

"Piss off!" I shrieked, throwing the potted plant I kept on the table by the front door at him. He laughed yet again, dodging the plant so it landed at his feet with the pot shattering and walked off, but not before flashing me the finger.

As I stood in the doorway trying to slow my breathing and my anger levels, Simon seemed to be hesitant to come near me. "It's fine, Simon. I'm not gonna throw a plant at you as well." As he moved more into the light spilling from my hallway, I saw he was dressed very nicely, much more casually than usual, in black jeans, a denim jacket and a maroon polo shirt, although the shirt was still buttoned as high as it could go. "Wow, Mr Business-Cas. Looking good."

Even such a simple compliment caused Simon to fluster, his face flushing a deep red. "Th-thanks, y-you look nice as well." His head turned to look where Julian had been standing, then he turned back to me. "Who was that?"

"You've just had the great honour of meeting my mental ex-boyfriend," I said grimly.

* * *

"_Blake?" Dad called to me. "Darling, are you awake?" My bedroom door creaked open. "Blake?"_

"_Yeah." My voice was weak, muffled by the duvet pulled up to my eyes. "I'm awake."_

"_I'm just off to work, love," he told me. "Your mum's left you a croissant on the worktop. Are you...going to be alright on your own?"_

"_I'll be fine. Thanks Daddy."_

"_See you later, love." A few seconds later, the front door opened and closed, and all that was left was silence._

_Alone. Alone, alone, alone. That's all I ever was nowadays. Nobody cared. Nobody gave a shit. I hadn't left this room in three days except to go to the toilet and all anyone could say was, "Mum's left you a croissant." Why the fuck would I care about a fucking pastry?! I was still terrified of eating solid food in case it did something to my jaw again. My jaw…_

_Much the same as every morning, I cursed the day I met Him. My jaw had only had its wire removed two weeks ago. So while he was out there still playing for the Wolves, still star of the town, still living his best life, I was here. I was isolated, I was broken, and I was empty. I was a shell of the girl I had been._

_As much as I hated it, I dragged myself out of bed and stood in front of my full-length mirror. My sickly white hands traced my torso, trailed over the ribs that protruded through my skin, went over the collarbones looking like they could burst through at any moment, dancing over the pelvic bone poking out like a science lab skeleton over the top of the old pyjama bottoms just barely clinging to my hips._

_He did this to me._

_I was horrifying, there was no polite way of putting it. My eyes looked sunken, my skin on my face waxy. I couldn't even tell you when I'd last washed my hair. Two weeks ago? It didn't matter, it wasn't like I did anything with it except tie it back in a lank ponytail. But why did it matter? No one saw me. No one cared._

_Sitting back down on the bed, I reached for my phone with a dull feeling of hope in my chest. Maybe someone, anyone, had tried to text me. That hope rapidly faded as I pushed the phone open and was greeted by exactly zero notifications. Not even one from Nathan._

_Some best friend. I hadn't heard a word from him in over a week, not since he'd dropped in last Wednesday with a tub of ice cream and a copy of Rob Zombie's Halloween that he'd borrowed from Blockbuster. Even then, he'd barely stuck around more than ten minutes after the credits rolled. I couldn't blame him; I wasn't much fun to be around these days._

_I could have texted him, of course I could, but truth be told...I didn't want to bother him. I didn't want to bother anyone. If I thought Nathan was being a bad friend, then with friends like Scott, Tyler, Alex, Trixie, Lizzie and Billy, who needed enemies? I hadn't heard a word from any of them since I'd been discharged from hospital almost two months ago. Well fuck them. Fuck them all._

_I ended up back in bed for the majority of the day, just...stewing. I knew I'd fallen asleep once or twice, I must have been in there for hours. The emptiness inside me was always so much more obvious when everyone was at work and school._

_I was sick of this. I was sick of everything. I was sick of feeling sorry for myself, I was sick of constantly being in pain, I was sick of looking like a bag of bones and most of all, I was sick of being in everyone's way. No one had said that, but I knew, I just knew. Nobody wanted me here anymore. Why would they?_

_Mum and Dad didn't even want me here, and I couldn't say I blamed them. I could have gone back to work and my flat days ago, but I was still hanging around here like a bad smell. They also hadn't said they didn't want me around, but why would they? Ella and Alfie were kids, they really did need looking after. I was a grown-arse woman moping around like a lazy teenager. I was just taking up space._

_I'd got my doctor to sign me off work for another month as well. I...I couldn't face the idea of going back. All those people, those loud noises, the crowds, and the fact there was nothing stopping Him from dropping in and paying me a visit. There were only two and a half weeks left on his restraining order. Once that was finished, he'd come back for me. I knew he would._

_What was wrong with me? How had I turned a man who supposedly loved me into such a monster? This had to be my fault. Maybe I talked back too much. Maybe if I'd just been quiet, he wouldn't have become the person he was when we split up. Maybe he wouldn't have hurt me._

_I couldn't do this anymore. I couldn't. It hurt too much. My head hurt, my limbs hurt, and my heart just felt void of anything. Soulless, even. I didn't want to feel like this anymore. I wouldn't feel like this anymore, I was about to make sure of it._

_I wrote a note. I couldn't leave my family without answers, I could never be that selfish. I apologised to them. Apologised for the mess I'd become, for being a terrible sister and a shitty daughter. I apologised for the hell I'd put them through while I was in hospital. I apologised for being a burden who needed ferrying to and from the court dates. I apologised to whoever had to find me. And I told them all how much I loved them._

_The final paragraph was dedicated to Nathan. Despite how bitter my thoughts had become, I told him how he was the best friend a girl could ever ask for. I penned a few memories I didn't want him to forget, like how my strapless dress had fallen down at our Year 11 prom and his idea of covering me up was to give me two red solo cups to stick over my boobs. I told him not to blame himself; he'd saved my life the day he stood between Him and me, but in the end, no one could have saved what I'd become. I finished the paragraph the same way I had finished my family's: a declaration of love. **You're the one I loved most of all, Nathan. You're my whole world, and the most important person in it. Please remember me as the Blake you truly knew; happy, feisty and full of life. I just wish I could have been her forever.  
I love you all. I'm sorry. ****Y****ours, ****always and forever****, Blake x**_

_Wiping the tears from my eyes, I grabbed some blu-tack from my desk and pinned the note to my bedroom door, where it would easily be found. Biting my lip to keep anymore tears at bay, I turned and headed to the bathroom, my entire being completely numb at this point._

_Using almost robotic movements, I rifled through the bathroom cabinet. I shoved aside boxes of plasters, a tube of Deep Heat, some sponges and Mum's peroxide, until I found what I was looking for. I prised open the plastic box of Dad's fresh razor blades and grabbed the first one in there._

_With a shaking hand, I lifted the blade up and pressed the sharp tip into the top of my left wrist. Bright scarlet droplets of blood appeared the second the blade broke the skin, but I was so desensitized to what was happening that I barely felt a thing. The numbness continued as I dug the blade in deeper and dragged it down my forearm, blood now flowing freely from the wound._

_I still felt nothing. Nothing but light wooziness._

_Razor blade still clutched in my hand, I collapsed back against the bathroom wall and slowly slid down until I hit the floor. Blood was trickling down my arm, over my palm and beginning to pool on the bathroom floor. The more blood that flowed, the more the wooziness intensified. I was staring at the red puddle spreading over the grey tiles, but I was struggling to keep my head up. The wooziness was becoming blackness now, and a small smile played on my lips. Peace was coming...it would be over soon..._

_My eyes fluttered shut, and I could feel my breathing becoming laboured. Was that the front door opening…? No, it couldn't be...Mum and Dad weren't supposed to be home until 4 or 5...I was imagining things._

_The darkness was here. I could see it now. I wasn't scared. I was ready. It was finally over. The last thing I heard was the sound of my Dad running up the stairs, calling my name. I was sure it was my imagination again, my brain giving me what it thought I wanted, but I was glad. I always had been a Daddy's girl._

_Goodbye, Daddy...goodbye, everyone...I love you..._

* * *

I couldn't stop hugging myself. The entire walk to the nearby pub, The Crown and Thorn, I kept my arms tightly wrapped around my midsection, still somewhat shivering. The chill I'd felt from...what ever Julian had tried to do to me was lingering. I felt frozen all over, my bones like splinters of ice in my skin. It had to be a power; how else would I be able to feel it?

"Are you cold?" Simon asked courteously. "You can have my jacket if you like."

I shook my head. "N-no...no, I'm not cold." Not in the sense he thought, anyway. "Thank you though, Si, I really appreciate it." My voice sounded so small, so unlike me. Should I tell him about Julian's potential power? I didn't know. This was supposed to be a chilled night out, I didn't want to worry him. Nope, nope, nope. I'd deal with this shitty unexpected development tomorrow. Julian could get fucked. "Fucking arsehole," I grumbled under my breath, though apparently not as quietly as I'd thought.

"You...you don't get on with your ex-boyfriend, do you?" Simon said hesitantly.

"Am I being that obvious?" I said sarcastically, shoving open the pub door as we approached it, breathing in deeply to inhale that classic smoke-and-beer scent in the air. Ah, smelt like home. I turned back to Simon, who nodded. "What can I say. By this point, it's a hate-hate relationship."

"I'm sorry if you think I'm intruding," he replied as we sat down in a far-corner booth, taking off his leather jacket and neatly folding it onto the seat next to him.

I shrugged. "I don't hide who I am. A lot of people know my business with Julian from the papers, there's nothing left _to_ hide at this point."

Simon's eyebrows raised. "Papers? What do you mean?"

I sighed, mentally facepalming. Of course Simon – quiet, nerdy, totally un-sports-oriented Simon – wouldn't have given the Wertham Star a second glance when Julian's trial was in full swing. How would he have known? "This is gonna be a long story, and one that will require me to have a drink in front of me to tell it. Give me two secs."

I went to stand up, but Simon beat me to it, sliding out of the booth. "No, no, I'll get these ones. You've had a rough day. What would you like?"

"Oh Simon, you're so sweet," I said graciously. "Are you sure? I can give you a fiver." He shook his head insistently, smiling slightly. "Alright then, thank you kindly. I'll have a pint of Strongbow, please." With yet another nod, Simon disappeared in the direction of the bar. I leaned my head back against my chair and sighed, my head kind of throbbing. How did Julian always manage to draw this kind of reaction from me? I knew it was what he wanted, so why did I respond? Because I was a mess, that was why. A fucking depression-filled, anxiety-driven mess with terrible impulse control. That, and the fact I was 90% sure he'd developed some kind of fucked up mind control power.

My phone vibrated next to me. I was scared to look at it. I knew who it was without taking a single glance at the screen. Setting my mouth in a firm line, I reached out and picked up the phone. Sure enough, there was his initial displayed boldly on-screen.

**\- One New Message -  
J**

**We're not done, Princess. I'll see you soon.**

_**Fuck off.**_ was the simple reply I sent, and just for good measure, I shut my phone off completely. I was not dealing with this, not now. Not ever, if I could help it. 'I'll see you soon.' Who the fuck did he think he was, some cliché Bond villain? Give me a break.

"Here you go," Simon's voice suddenly floated into my thoughts, and a pint glass of gloriously amber liquid was placed in front of me.

"Much appreciated," I said, holding the glass up to clink against his bottle of Bud. "To community service. May our rehabilitation turn us into upstanding members of society." We both took a long sip, then I let out a sigh once again. "I don't even know where to begin."

"You don't have to tell me if you don't want to," Simon said seriously.

I shook my head. "My therapist says it's good for me to talk about these things, and it has gotten easier over time. More importantly, you're my friend, Simon, you deserve to know." I took a deep breath and launched straight into the tale of When Blake Met Julian…

"I was only nineteen when Julian and I first met. There's a track around the outskirts of the rugby grounds that a lot of people use for dog walking and running. That's where I was. I used to run quite a bit back then, it used to help me break up my college work. The senior team was training too that day, but the track gave the pitch a wide enough berth that I didn't think it would be an issue. Turns out I was wrong. Someone tried to take a particularly violent attempt at a try conversion and the wind caught the ball. Cue me getting wiped out by said rugby ball and landing on my face in the dirt.

"So I'm lying there in my running gear, spitting dry mud and grass out of my mouth when I hear someone running over to me, followed by, 'hey, are you okay?' I looked up, and it was him. He was so gorgeous, it was the only thought I could actually bring up at the time. I knew who he was, obviously. I love rugby, I'd been following the Wolves for a couple of seasons. I just couldn't believe star player Julian Quinn was paying attention to me, let alone asking me if I was okay. I was fine, obviously, but I let him help me stand up because...I don't know, I wanted him to. He smiled at me, made sure I was okay one more time then buggered off back to his training session.

"I did another two laps of the field and while I was at the gate changing my running trainers to my normal trainers, there he was again. And he was smiling again. My God, that smile. That's where the problems started. I melted the second he looked at me, I would have done anything for him. I'm not a shy person, you know that, but that smile had me blushing like a stupid little girl. I didn't know what to say. He asked for my name, and I told him within a millisecond. Looking back, the fact he didn't bother telling me his and just assumed I'd know it should have been my first warning about what a narcissistic fuckhead he was."

I paused for a moment, taking a long drink from the glass in front of me before continuing, "But back then, what did I know? All I saw was this beautiful, rugged, talented rugby player who could have had any woman in town, but somehow all he was paying attention to was me. What was I supposed to do when he asked me out for a drink that weekend, say no? Of course not. I agreed to the date as soon as he'd finished asking the question.

"That was the beginning of the end. We were official almost laughably quickly, I think it was about three weeks later? And you know what, for the first six or seven months, everything was perfect. I was so in love with him, it practically blinded me. All I saw was Julian. Nathan _hated _it, and hated Julian too. I thought he was just jealous that I was now spending time with someone who wasn't him, so I ignored him. It actually started to drive a wedge between, something that had never happened before ever. The worst part was, I didn't even care. I had Julian, I didn't think I needed anyone else."

My hand was shaking as I took another drink, the guilt of remembering how badly I'd treated Nathan back then making me feel sick. "Then he hit me for the first time. I didn't see it coming. We'd been clubbing with a few of his rugby mates, and he'd thought one of them was flirting with me. I argued with him, told him he was being fucking stupid and of course no one was flirting with me. He didn't listen, and I got one hell of a backhand for my trouble. The black eye didn't go down for two weeks, I had to tell people that a kid at the park accidentally hit me with a rounders bat. Somehow, people believed me. That just made it worse.

"After that, it was like anything that pissed Julian off had to be taken out on me. I looked a guy for longer than half a second? A slap. I argued back? A scratch or two. The Wolves lost a game? A Chinese burn...maybe a punch if it was really bad. I learned how to cover up the bruises pretty quickly. I didn't see the point in telling anyone what Julian was doing to me; if I hadn't told them when it started, why would they believe me now?"

My voice cracked, a few tears escaping from the corner of my eye. "I don't know what caused me to snap the night I finally split up with him last Christmas. The lies he was spewing in front of all his friends, seeing the bullshit 'perfect boyfriend' routine, the fact I flinched every time he moved near me, maybe. It didn't matter. I thought I'd got away with it, but Julian was never gonna let me get away with embarrassing him so publicly. He followed me home. Nathan was there with me but he wasn't strong enough to stop...to stop him..." I covered my mouth with my hand, stifling the choking noises I was beginning to make, my other hand frantically wiping tears from my cheeks. "I'm so sorry..."

Simon reached across the table and placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. "Blake, you don't need to tell me anymore if you don't want to."

Shaking my head, I wiped the last of the tears from my face and cleared my throat. I needed to finish; I always broke down at this point and refused to say anymore. Not this time. Julian would not silence me, not again. "I'm just gonna say it; he broke my jaw." I didn't miss how Simon flinched, his mouth dropping open in aghast shock. "I know, it's beyond fucked up, but he did. Nathan had already called the police but they were too late. I'd never seen him like that, he was so...so _angry_. Him and Julian were still kicking the shit out of each other when the cops and paramedics arrived. Julian got arrested and I got taken to hospital. I just...I just wish that was the last time I'd be in that hospital, but it wasn't."

"Blake, you don't-" Simon started to say, withdrawing his hand, but I interrupted him.

"There's no point pussyfooting around it, Simon. You've seen my sessions on Tuesday, you must have realised something is wrong with me. Attempting suicide will do that to ya, but of course, I couldn't even do that right. My dad found me, got me back to the hospital. A lot of words describing my head got thrown around, but eventually they settled on depression, anxiety and PTSD. So I got sectioned. For two weeks I was in that goddamn hospital getting prised apart by shrinks, but I will be honest, talking it through and getting put on medication has really helped me out. Julian broke me, but recently I've really started to sort myself back out. I'm almost me again."

When I'd mentioned I'd been sectioned, I noticed Simon's hand clench around his beer bottle, his knuckles almost turning white under the pressure. I frowned, but elected not to ask the question. I figured if Simon wanted to discuss something, he would, but he didn't. Instead, he gave me a sympathetic smile and quietly said, "I'm sorry you had to go through that, you didn't deserve it in the slightest."

"Everyone has to go through something shitty to prove they can come out the other side, right?" I shrugged, draining my glass and returning his smile. "So what about you, Mr Arsonist? What's your story? Why'd you try and burn someone's house down?" Simon suddenly looked so sombre that I immediately backtracked. "Sorry, I didn't mean to cross into No Man's Land. Don't answer if you don't want to."

"No, I'll tell you. It's only fair."

"You sure?"

"Yes. It started in secondary school. The boy who lived next door to me…he stopped talking to me when we started Year Seven. He thought he was too cool to be seen with me. He started to bully me, just out of nowhere. It was horrible, and he got the other cool boys in our year to join in. I couldn't handle it. Every morning I'd wake up for school, and just thinking about it would make me feel sick."

"That is bloody awful. You poor thing." School-yard bullies were the fucking worst, just jumped up little pricks who thought they were better than everyone else just because Mummy and Daddy had a bit more money than other people. "Didn't you tell anyone? Your parents? The teachers?"

Simon nodded. "Both. They didn't do anything. Nothing happened, and it got worse. We left that school when we were eighteen, but even then he still wouldn't talk to me except to make fun of me."

"So I'm going out on a limb here and assuming it was his house you tried to burn down?" I queried.

He nodded again. "A few months ago, he sent me a text. He was inviting me to meet him on a night out. I thought…I thought he wanted to apologise. To make things up between us. So I decided to meet him at the club he'd told me he'd be at. I found him in the corner, with his mates and a couple of girls. He looked me up and down, and I knew then that he hadn't sent that text as an apology."

"He didn't send it as a piss take, did he?" I said angrily.

Simon shook his head. "It was worse. He'd sent it to me as a mistake. It was one of the most humiliating moments of my life." He looked down, an expression of absolute mortification on his face.

"Oh Simon," I said gently. His hand was positioned on the table next to his glass, so I reached out and placed my hand over his. He jumped at the contact at first, but then continued with his story.

"I was furious, so angry that I went home and for the first time ever, I…I got drunk," he admitted.

"Ah, alcohol. The cause of, and solution to, all of life's problems," I quoted from _The Simpsons_.

Simon grinned weakly at me, but I could tell there was no heart in it. "I was thinking about everything he'd done to me at school. I…I lost it. I went round to his house. Nobody was in there, I made sure of it."

"No point adding murder to the rest of the charges." I was probably beginning to make too many jokes at this point but sometimes my only way of coping with heavy situations was injecting (dark) humour into it.

"I didn't want to hurt anyone," Simon told me. "I just wanted to make him see what he was doing to me was wrong. I soaked some tissues in lighter fluid, I set them on fire then dropped them through the letter box. But I messed up. There was a cat in the house."

"Wait, what? A cat…?" I repeated, furrowing my brows in confusion.

"I could hear it meowing behind the door. I panicked, I didn't want to hurt the cat, the cat didn't do anything!" Simon's voice had taken on a vaguely hysterical tone.

"Well yeah, it's a cat," I said lightly. "If you're getting bullied by a cat then there might be a few problems. So...what did you do? Did you break the door down?"

"No...no, I-I didn't have any water or anything, and I wasn't strong enough to break the door down. I could see the carpet catching fire through the window, so I...I…I pissed through the letter box." ...What_._

I leaned back in complete shock. "I'm sorry, what? You pissed…through the letter box? Like, literally pissed?" I couldn't help it. I started laughing.

"That was when his mum came home, and she was just screaming in the driveway. I tried to stop, but I couldn't, it just kept coming! Please stop, I'm being serious!"

At this point I was cackling with laughter, almost bent double in my seat. "I'm sorry! I shouldn't be laughing, and I swear I'm trying to stop! Oh my God…" I forced myself to calm down. Once I had, I looked him dead in the eyes, held his hand tighter and said, "I bet the dickhead whose house it was totally deserved it. If it's any consolation, if I'd been at school with you, I would have kicked his arse."

"Thanks Blake. You're a really good friend."

The serious conversations now subsided, I headed to the bar to grab us a couple more drinks and Still, the rest of the evening passed really well. I really felt like I was getting to know Simon properly We discussed our favourite movies (his was _2001: A Space Odyssey_, mine was _The Exorcist_), our favourite music (he was a fan of Echo and the Bunnymen, while I obviously hero-worshipped bands like BMTH and Nirvana), our favourite TV shows (His, _Battlestar Galactica, _mine_,_ _Buffy the Vampire Slayer_) and anything and everything in between.

By the time we were ready to leave, it was totally pitch black when we emerged from the pub, the only sources of light coming from the very spaced out streetlights and the occasional passing car. According to my phone it was half past ten, so we'd been out a good three and a half hours. It was also freezing cold, and I was shivering in spite of my jeans and boots. Goddamn it, why didn't I bring a jacket.

We made light conversation for the majority of the walk back to my block of the estate, but it petered out towards the final five minutes of the journey. I had a feeling Simon's social battery may have been run dry over the last couple of hours; I'd heard him talk more tonight than I had the entirety of the last three weeks.

"Right, this is me," I said as we walked up to my front door. We both stood outside the door for a second. "I had a really nice time tonight, Simon. Thank you."

"I did too," he replied, giving me one of his shy little smiles.

I smiled back at him, then opened the front door. "Sleep well, see you in the morning."

I went to step inside but Simon reached out and grabbed my hand, stopping me in my tracks. "Blake, wait!"

"What's up?"

"Would...would you like to go out again?" The words came out of Simon's mouth so quickly I had to give myself a second to process them.

"Of course I would," I said good-naturedly, wondering why that question had been so important. "Hopefully next time we'll be able to persuade the others next time, and we can all-"

"No, not with everyone," he interrupted. "Just...just you and me. For dinner."

"For _dinner_?" I repeated incredulously, and without meaning to, I repeated the exact same words Nathan had used to torment him earlier on today. "Are you asking me out on a _date_?"

He nodded slowly, looking like a deer in headlights.

Oh God, no. No, no, no, this was exactly what I didn't want to happen! Simon was the nicest, sweetest boy I'd ever met, but I saw him in a very younger brother way, I wasn't attracted to him in the slightest. There was only one member of the ASBOees that I wanted to go on a date with, and he was so emotionally unavailable that it was pointless. I didn't know what to do. So I panicked, and rejected that poor sweet boy in this harshest way I probably could have.

"Simon…I…I'm sorry. I can't. I need to go. I'll see you tomorrow." I pulled my hand out of his and bolted through my front door, slamming it in his devastated, confused face.

Why couldn't anything in my life just stay simple?

* * *

**A/N – A bit of a long chapter but I really wanted to get a bit more of Blake's backstory out into the open, and I hope you enjoyed it. It's the flashback episode next and I am so excited to show you all exactly how Blake ended up in everyone's favourite orange jumpsuit. Please review, this is an almost canon-less chapter so I'd love to hear opinions and ideas! Love to all! Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Nine Playlist  
**_**Turbulent – **_**Waterparks  
_Better Off Dead _\- Sleeping With Sirens  
**_**Alone**_** – Sleeping With Sirens ft. MGK**


	10. Be Kind, Rewind

**A/N – So we're at the flashback episode, and to properly do it justice I'm gonna be cutting time between the night at the bowling alley and present day, especially since there's only like 10 minutes of 'today' in the episode. Many thanks for Judging. All Day Every Day for your lovely review!**

* * *

**Chapter Ten – Be Kind, Rewind**

"Come on, Blakey." Nathan swapped his bowling bag over to his other hand and wrapped his arm around my shoulders. "You're gonna have a crackin' night, I promise! Think how great it'll feel when you kick Scott and Alex's arses."

"Nathan..." I said weakly, drawing my open checked shirt tighter around me. "I don't think I should have come. This doesn't feel right..."

"Nothing is gonna go wrong, B," he said casually, giving me a squeeze. "What, you think I'm gonna let anything hurt you? Don't be stupid."

"I'm not worried about getting hurt," I insisted. "I just...there's gonna be a lot of people in there."

"There were a lot of people in the unit with ya," Nathan pointed out. "And they were proper mentals."

"Yeah but I was one of the mentals," I reminded him. "I felt safe in the unit. This is- this is different."

"I seem to recall you sayin' you woke up and saw your roommate watching you sleep the first night there. That does not sound very fuckin' safe to me."

"Yeah, alright, so maybe Lucy was a particular brand of 'headcase' but that's not the point," I argued. "The unit wasn't crowded. The unit wasn't public. Okay, it wasn't full of obnoxious pricks, there were no loud noises or bright lights. There are here. And I'm- I'm scared, Nate." My voice dropped to a whisper for the last sentence.

"You don't _need_ to be scared," he said breezily, continuing to practically drag me towards to car park exit. "I told ya, I'll fuck up anyone who tries anything with you. I've been hittin' the gym just so I can be your own personal bodyguard."

"Now why do I feel like that's a lie?"

"Alright fine, I've been doin' Davina McCall's _Super Body Workout_, but that's not what's fuckin' important. What _is_ important is that I'm at least eighty percent sure I could crush a Coke can between my elbow and absolutely massive bicep now."

"I feel sick," I mumbled as a last-ditch effort to get him to take me home, which was enough to get Nathan to stop in his tracks in the middle of the underground car park.

He lowered his bowling bag to the ground and gently took me by the shoulders, giving me a small shake. "No you don't. I'm not gonna let you fuckin' fester away in your flat again, Blakey. I did that last time and I nearly fuckin' lost you. I might not be good at the whole 'sensitivity' shit, but for fuck's sake, try to make it a bit easier for me."

I reflexively flinched at the mention of 'what I'd done' - our euphemism for what caused my second hospitalisation – and immediately closed my hand over the still-red, healing scar on my left wrist. "I never wanted to hurt you. I didn't want to hurt anyone." As usual, my eyes filled with tears as I remembered all the turmoil I'd put my closest family through

"No, no." Nathan's hands moved to my face, his thumbs brushing the tears away. "No cryin'! I refuse to let you cry anymore!" I let out a sad hiccup. "Nope. I'm fixin' this, now." His hands found their way under my arms and, with absolutely zero warning, he began to tickle me. "I'm not stoppin' till I see a smile!" Fuck's sake! Leave it to Nathan to use my one top-secret weakness against me. The second his hands connected with my body, I let out a loud shriek as that uncomfortable tickling sensation spread through my person. I both cringed up like a little ball and attempted to pull myself out of his grasp, but due to my current less-than-ideal body weight, I couldn't put up much of a fight against Nathan's 6-foot, lanky yet oddly powerful physique. Maybe those Davina sessions really had paid off.

"N-No! N-Nathan, s-stop!" I spluttered out, bent over trying to shake him off. I was laughing, sure, but tickle torture was _not _how I'd envisaged my first night out since leaving the psych ward three weeks ago. "I'll s-smile, I p-promise! J-just get off!"

"Let me see that smile then!" he ordered, and I twisted my head and bared my teeth at him, reluctant giggles still escaping me. "Bee-yoo-tiful!" He let go of me and pulled me into a tight hug. "See, that wasn't so bad, was it?"

"You're an arsehole," I grumbled, hugging him back.

"Correct, but I'm your favourite arsehole," he said smugly. "More importantly, that's the first time I've heard you laugh in, like, months. I deserve some kinda fuckin' medal for that."

I rolled my eyes. "I'll make sure to buy you a drink to reward you for that amazing feat."

"Now there's the snarky Blakey I know." Nathan leaned forward and placed a wet, sloppy kiss on my forehead before bending down to retrieve his bowling bag. "Come on, I need to get my warm-up game on before I can properly unleash my bowling prowess upon you three mortals."

I smirked. "Come on, we both know that out of the two of us, I could whoop your arse from here to Coventry."

Nathan grinned, apparently chuffed with himself that he'd managed to curtail my looming breakdown. "That sounds like a challenge, little lady."

I shrugged. "Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. All I'm saying is, loser buys the pic n' mix."

"Oh you are so on!"

* * *

The problem with having a best mate who was considered_ somewhat_ hysterical in the ol' noggin was that Nathan never knew when I'd decide to rock up at the community centre at 7am on the verge of a minor meltdown. This, unluckily for him, was one of those mornings. As I'm sure comes as a huge surprise by this point, I didn't sleep that night at all. Fuck, I felt awful.

Any other way. I could have told Simon 'no' in quite possibly _any other way _if I'd given it even half a second of thought. But no. I had formed into the literal human embodiment of Nathan in front of his very eyes when I'd unintentionally echoed the Irishman's exact taunting words...and then I'd slammed the door in his face. I knew Nath and I had a habit of sharing thoughts but that one was a bit too on the fucking nose to be comfortable with.

On top of the raging guilt I was consumed by, the was also the very large fucking problem in the form of Julian Quinn. In all of the fucked up things that had happened in this fucked up town over the last few fucked up weeks, this really did take the crown of Most Fucked Up Thing of All. Part of me still didn't want to believe it was true, to just bury my head in the sand and pretend it never happened. Unfortunately, powers didn't seem to work that way and I knew I would have to deal with him – and it – sooner rather than later, especially with Julian's promise of 'I'd see him soon.'

And so, that was how I ended up on Nathan's mezzanine this fine morning, both of us sat closely together on his mattress under his duvet, my legs overlapping his. After dousing him with a cold glass of water to wake him up and immediately getting cussed out for doing so, he shut up pretty quickly when he saw how traumatised I looked. Credit where credit is due, he actually sat up and listened to what I had to say instead of just rolling over and going back to sleep. No, scratch that, the second he heard Julian's name leave my lips, I had Nathan's complete and undivided attention.

I told him everything. Everything that didn't involve a certain Simon Bellamy, that was. I told him about Julian's text messages and phone calls over the last couple of weeks, about him turning up in my flat last night, about him trying to get me to agree to leave Wertham with him...and about how he'd almost made me do it.

"Riiiight..." Nathan drew out at the end of my near-half an hour explanation. "Let me get this straight. You're tellin' me that your Neanderthal ex has somehow got one of these fuckin' powers and all?"

I nodded slowly. "It's the only explanation I have. He must have some kind of mind control, or at least be able to influence people's decisions. I hate to say it, but I think it's the former. I didn't just feel influenced; I felt compelled. Not only that, I was blacking out. I bet he could have got me to do anything he wanted once I was fully under." The thought of that alone terrified me.

"That is one of the sickest things I have ever heard," Nathan spat. "Like, this goes beyond that time you puked all over yourself on Oblivion at Alton Towers and some of it splattered that old man behind you."

"Really, Nathan?" I groaned. "Is that even remotely correlated to the conversation we're currently having?"

"I'm just puttin' it into perspective!" he defended himself. A pause. "So...what do you think we should do about him?"

"About Julian?" I frowned. "Honestly, I don't know. I don't want to give him any more attention if I can help it, but he reckons he'll try again."

"That fucker..." Nathan looked fucking murderous. Sometimes I was sure he actually hated Quinn more than I did. He'd certainly hated him a lot bloody longer. "Blake, I swear to fuckin' God, if he comes near you again, you gotta tell me."

"Nath, I love you, but this needs to be my fight," I told him. "I only told you because the idea of not getting it off my chest has been doing my head in." I pointed at the dark circles under my eyes. "See these? These are the result of yet another sleepless night because of these fucking powers. I am this close to asking my doctor to put me on a higher milligram antidepressant just so I have stronger sedatives."

"I like to think you told me 'cause I'm your fuckin' best friend," Nathan shot back. "Come on, Blakey, I deserve to get a good whack in on that prick. I never got him back for that cock-shot he hit me with last year."

"Babe, he'd flatten you," I said shortly.

"Hey, I am a lot stronger than I was back then," he protested. "I'm still doin' my Davina workouts, I'm fit as a fuckin' fiddle."

"I thought you told me you were only watching those because you liked a fit older woman?"

"Potato, potarto." He waved his hand dismissively. "I could and can still kick his arse."

"Well, should I need backup then I know where to come calling." I shoved the duvet off me and stood up with a huge stretch, it felt like my back had gone numb from leaning against the metal mezzanine railings. "We should get ready, I think the others will be here soon."

"Urgh." Nathan collapsed back down with his face mushed into his pillow. "Can't I have five more minutes after I was so rudely awakened?"

"You know, everyone might know you're homeless but do you really want them to see it firsthand?" I asked with a quirked brow. "They might start bringing you copies of _The Big Issue_ to cope."

Funnily enough, Nathan shot to his feet in moments. "Fair point, let's roll."

* * *

"Hey, there she is! Lady B in the flesh!" Scott crowed as soon as he saw me, leaping from his seat the second Nathan and I arrived at our lane for the night and enveloping me in a very Lynx Africa-scented bear hug. I immediately hugged him back, kicking my legs in the air as he lifted me up; it had been so long since I'd seen him or Alex that I actually felt quite emotional.

"Oi, don't hog the girl all to yourself!" Alex joked, tapping Scott on the shoulder to make him put me down, before I was immediately pulled into a second rib-breaking hug. "It's good to see you back, B. Hasn't been the same without your beautiful face breaking up all the ugly mugs around here."

I laughed, placing a quick kiss on his cheek. "You guys are gonna make me cry! It's- it's really nice to be back. I've missed all of you so much. Doesn't mean I'm gonna go easy on any of ya!"

"Aha, now that is what I'm talkin' about!" Scott exclaimed, fist-pumping the air. "It wouldn't be a gang bowling night if Blake didn't beat us all by fifty points."

"Hey, I resent that!" Nathan chipped in, not-so-subtly sliding between Alex and I and slinging his arm around my waist. Hm, a bit weird. "I'm on a winnin' streak, don't be puttin' her back on a pedestal!"

"Er, pretty sure you've only been winning 'cause she's been...otherwise engaged," Alex said delicately, clearly unsure what would trigger me.

"You can say I've been in hospital, Al," I said, biting my lip anxiously. Okay, _I_ didn't like saying I'd been in hospital, but I didn't want my mates feeling like they had to walk on eggshells so I didn't crack up in front of them. As it was, all three men suddenly seemed a lot more subdued than when we'd arrived so I decided to break the tension I'd created by heading over to the snack area and getting the three of them a pint and myself a can of Coke; while still so fresh on my new medication, it wouldn't be a good idea to get drunk tonight.

I was relatively quiet for the first few turns we each had. The loud voices and music seemed so overpowering at first, I almost decided to just leave then and there. I couldn't do this, it was too much, it was too soon. Even the sound of the bowling balls landing in the lanes was making me flinch. They sounded like strikes against the skin. They sounded like His fist connecting with my face.

That was when I almost bolted. I couldn't be somewhere that reminded me of Him. I had my hand on my backpack strap, ready to make a run for it...when Nathan whirled around from the second gutterball he'd thrown and grinned at me, making a 'this close' gesture with his hands. "So close!" he smirked, sauntering back over to us and ignoring both Scott and Alex's expressions of 'you're shit, mate.' He plopped down on the plastic seat next to mine, and I didn't miss his eyes clock my hand wrapped around the bag handle. "Blakey? Whatcha doin'?"

"I- I, um, I-" I stuttered, unsure what to say. "The- the sounds…the banging..."

"Oh Jesus." Nathan immediately began to panic, just like he did every time I started to have a moment. I'd done this twice since leaving the unit, both times while with Nathan, and both times he'd freaked out almost as badly as I was threatening to and tried to call an ambulance. "It's okay! Everything is okay, Blakey! You want earplugs?! I'll find some earplugs! Or...or I'll make everyone stop bowlin' if that's what you want! Just tell me what's gonna make it better and I'll do it! HEY!" He raised his voice and leapt to his feet, starting to shout at the other bowlers. "Stop bowlin' so fuckin' loudly! Some of us have noise sensitivity, ya know! It's a serious condition!"

"Nathan!" I hissed, grabbing his arm and yanking him down to my height. "Stop making a dick of yourself, people are staring! I'll be fine, I just...I panicked! I told you, I'm not good with loud noises at the minute, but I'll be okay. Please, chill out or you're gonna make it worse."

Nathan deflated slightly, retaking his seat. "Sorry...sorry. Got a bit carried away. I just don't wanna see you like that, y'know? I don't like it."

I placed my hand on his knee and squeezed, giving him a small smile. "I appreciate the concern, Nathan, you know I do, and I love you for it. But if I'm gonna get better, I need to learn to get through these...episodes by myself. I'm not broken glass, and...and you're not always gonna be here to help me."

"I can try," he sulked, slumping back in the chair.

"And I want you to," I said simply. "But I also want you to let me be a mess. I need to get over this. I can't let- I can't let Him beat me."

"When'd you get so brave, hm?" Nathan laughed, nudging me in the ribs with his elbow. "I remember when you used to get me to kill the spiders in the playground, now it's like you don't even need lil' ol' me."

Now it was my turn to laugh, leaning my head on his shoulder. "Those were the days, huh? I'm starting to wish I was still scared of spiders, y'know? That I didn't have to be so brave. All this is just a pile of wank." I turned to look at him. "Just for the record, I'll always need you, Nathan. Who else is gonna call me out on my bullshit?"

Nathan snorted and gestured between Alex and Scott; Scott was laughing at Alex's bowl which had resulted in a split pin, while Alex did his best to ignore his best mate jumping around him in a circle trying to put him off. "Not these two fuckers, that's for sure."

"We heard that!" Alex protested as he went for his second roll, managing to knock over the left pin. "Fuck _yes_! Neck and neck with Blake!" He whirled around to grin at me. "Looks like the queen is getting dethroned tonight."

I hopped to my feet, a smirk on my lips. "We're only four turns in, Ally. I'm gonna beat your arse so hard."

"Ooh, please!" He waggled his eyebrows suggestively. "You know I like it rough."

I selected the midnight blue bowling ball from the returns shelf and stuck my fingers into it, cradling it up against my chest. "Then game on. You're about to get it so rough you won't sit down properly for a week!"

* * *

"I am so stressed out, I literally feel like my hair is gonna start falling out," I grumbled as Nathan and I entered the locker rooms, naturally the first ones in there at this hour. "At this rate I'm gonna be asking Kelly if she still has that wig hanging around." I slammed open my locker and pulled out my jumpsuit, glaring at the orange material bunched up in my hand.

"Does Weird Kid know about this?" Nathan asked, in the process of changing into his own filthy jumpsuit. "You know, since you went on that little nerd date of yours last night?"

"What?" I said sharply. "What are you talking about? How do you know about that? Did he tell you?"

Nathan scoffed. "No. You updated your Facebook to -" He made quotation marks with his fingers. "'Having a drink with Simon' and unless that was some kinda innuendo for you deciding you've had enough of nun life and you were actually fuckin' him, I assumed that, well…you went out for a drink with him."

I scratched the back of my neck awkwardly. "It wasn't a date, we just went for a drink. As _friends_. And no, I didn't tell him. I didn't want to deal with it right away."

"So I'm the only one who knows?"

"Well yeah," I said obviously. "You're the only one who knows Julian to actually give a shit. Why the grilling? There's nothing else to know."

"Why are you bein' so jumpy?" he asked, narrowing his eyes suspiciously.

"What are you talking about? I'm not being jumpy," I said, trying to sound flippant as the two of us headed out of the locker rooms.

"Hate to break it to ya, love, but you kinda are," he replied with a smirk. "So come on, tell me what happened. I can just imagine all the lovely little conversations the two of you had about all the nerdy things he could think of. You gotta tell me, is Weird Kid just as strange and starey away from this place? He's gotta be, that kinda pupil dilation doesn't just disappear."

"Stop calling him Weird Kid. It's horrible. And anyway, you could have found all that out for yourself. He did invite you as well," I pointed out. "You were the one who said no and dumped the poor guy on his arse." _Just like you did,_ a spiteful little voice piped up in my mind. Oh brilliant, now I was hearing voices. Time to add schizophrenia to the list of growing mental problems.

"I couldn't go, I had important shit to be getting on with," he argued. "And I'll have you know that I now highly resent you for abandonin' me for Weird Kid and leavin' me to drink that Grey Goose all on my lonesome."

I snorted. "Oh yeah, like what? I don't think having a wank is classed as 'important shit'."

"That's female logic for you," he said with a shake of his head. "You have much to learn."

"I'd really rather not. The specifications of male pleasure isn't something I can really see helping me achieve a new job when this is over and done with," I said.

"Depends on whether you plan on becomin' a prostitute or not. You've got the face for it."

"Am I supposed to be complimented by that?"

Nathan nodded sagely. "Of course. What girl doesn't want to hear that she could have a lucrative career in the sexual arts?"

"I don't know, the one who's still terrified of men and sex?" I deadpanned.

"...Okay, you got me there. Didn't mean to poke that sore spot," he said somewhat guiltily. "So, please tell me then, what _did_ you and Weird Kid spend all night talking about if it wasn't about this new...development of fuckery? I find it hard to believe he can hold a conversation for more than thirty seconds, what with that cripplin' shyness and the such."

"Nate, I told you, stop being so horrible about him," I warned, my guilt over rejecting Simon's date manifesting into a weird need to protect him from Nathan's harshness. "We did talk about Julian. We couldn't not, he almost knocked Simon out when I tossed the fucker out of my flat and he wanted to know who the Hulk-man I was screaming abuse at was. He then told me why he set that house on fire."

"Seriously? Tell me, tell me!"

"Nooo way, that is not my story to tell. It's way too personal. He can tell you if he wants to, 'cause I sure as hell ain't."

"So _that's_ how you spent your night? Swappin' tales about your fucked up personal lives?" Nathan asked sceptically.

"Obviously not just that, we spoke about other stuff. Nerd stuff you wouldn't care about. Then he walked me home," I answered, running an awkward hand through my hair. _You also __potentially broke his heart_. And the voice was back.

"Well it sounds like an oh-so interesting evening. I wish I'd been there instead of partaking in my night of lube-aided self-care," he mocked, pushing open the door to the hall. He suddenly paused, grabbing my arm. "D'you hear that?"

"Hear what?" I frowned. I strained to listen- then I heard it. Muffled moans and grunts were coming from behind the metal screen of the storage cabinet. "Oh my God. No way. That cannot be what I think it is. No _way_!" I covered my hands with my mouth as I exploded into immature giggles.

"Yes way, my dearest Blake," Nathan whispered. "This is better than anything on Pornhub! Come on, I wanna get the premium screenin'!" He held a finger to his lips and started creeping towards the screen, motioning for me to follow him.

"Leave them alone," I hissed as he approached the metal. "Let them get on with it."

Nathan just shook his head. Bending down, he gripped the bottom of the screen and tried to wrench it up, which was when he discovered they'd taken all the necessary precautions and locked it. Thank Jesus, because I really did not want to see what was happening between Curtis and Alisha in that storage cabinet. There were some things my poor, fragile retinas just would not recover from.

"Ooh, unlucky," I whisper-taunted him. He totally ignored me and instead demanded through the metal, "Are you two shaggin' in there?!"

"Fuck off, you pervert!" came Alisha's slightly breathless voice.

"I'm sorry!" I called to them. "I tried to get him to stop, I really did!"

"She's lyin'! She wanted to see just as much as I did! She's been goin' through a wee bit of a dry spell, ya know? Ow!" Nathan let out a yelp as I whacked his arm with my fist. "Anyway, how long are ya gonna be?"

"Will you piss off!?" Curtis yelled back, throwing something at the screen that made a metallic crashing noise.

"Okay," Nathan snorted in a mock-soothing tone. "Just give us a shout when you're done!"

As I looked at the maliciously excited expression on Nathan's face, I sighed, "We're gonna tell everyone about this, aren't we?"

"Indeed we are, Blakey. Indeed we are," he elatedly replied, dragging me by the arm in the direction of the locker rooms. Some things would never change.

* * *

"Fuck yes! Steee-rike number four!" I announced to the gaggle of men behind me as my bowling ball knocked down all ten pins once again. "Look at the scores and weep, my friends! Bow down before the Queen of Bowling!" Since getting my breakdown out of the way nice and early in the evening, I'd been having a great time with my friends. For the first time, I was actually happy to be out of the unit.

"There is no way you've just done that!" protested Scott. "You're cheating, you must be!"

I laughed and ruffled his fluffy brown hair. "It's bowling, how could I cheat? Come on, Scotty, just accept I'm better than all of you put together!" All he could do was give me a mock scowl as he moved to take his turn. He was such a sore loser sometimes, he could even be as bad as Nathan. Speaking of…

"I am never gonna catch up to you," the Irish one complained, looking up at the scoreboard. I followed his gaze.

_**Blake – 137  
Scott – 106  
Alex – 111  
Nathan – 72**_

"Wow, would you look at that," I drawled, smirking. "Only two turns each left. There is no way you can get sixty-five points in two turns. You know what that means, don't ya?"

"Loser buys the pic n' mix," he mumbled with a pout.

"Sorry, what was that?" I said with a false frown, cupping my ear. "I couldn't quite hear you over the music."

"Loser buys the pic n' mix!" he sulkily exclaimed.

"That's what I thought you said," I said smugly. "Tell you what, go and get them now and I'll save you the embarrassment of the guys seeing you."

"I think they can see the scoreboard."

"Don't cop an attitude with me just 'cause ya lost," I taunted. "Or do you want me to add Scott and Alex's snacks to the losing penalty too?"

"Fuck no, d'you think I'm made of money?!" He pushed himself to his feet with a huff. "Right, what do ya want? Might as well get meself something while I'm up."

"Get me some gummy bears, jelly snakes, chocolate Jazzies, a couple of Maoams, jelly beans, some chocolate mice and one of them sugar-coated dummies."

"I think you're missin' a word from that sentence."

"Please." I batted my eyelashes at him sweetly.

Unsurprisingly, he instantly softened. "Those eyes of yours are fuckin' deadly, ya know that?"

"I've been told," I laughed before before swatting at him. "Go on, move your arse. I'm hungry." With a final smirk, Nathan sauntered off in the direction of the snack area. I smiled after his retreating figure; I really did love that boy.

Draining my third can of Coke, I wondered if I should have added that to my prize as well. Hindsight was a wonderful thing. Scott and Alex both took their turns whilst Nathan was gone. Then he didn't come back. It had been like ten minutes, how long did it take to get some bloody pic n' mix? It wasn't like there'd be a line; Friday was late-night bowling, it was just after 11pm, the place was dead aside from like three other lanes in use.

"Where is that prick?" Scott piped up, not even looking up from texting.

"Probably taking a shit," Alex snorted.

I was about to agree with him when out of nowhere, a voice announced over the Tannoy system, "Can I have Security to the concession stand, please!"

I let out a loud groan. "Please God, no, please tell that's not for who I think it's for."

"You know Nathan better than all of us, Blake," Alex said grimly. "I reckon you've answered that for yourself."

We were both proven right when the Tannoy whined to life, and Nathan's voice squawked through the speakers, "I'm being assaulted by a chick with a dick!"

"Aw, for _fuck's _sake!" I moaned, leaping to my feet and taking off towards the snacks as Nathan's voice was still booming out around the alley, bawling, "They sewed up his clunge! They sewed up his clunge!"

I skidded into the carpeted area and thundered through the aisles of sweets until I was confronted with the sight of Nathan being pinned to the ground by the somewhat overweight manager of the bowling alley (I assumed.) Nathan was letting out the strangest yelling noises into the walkie-talkie whilst the manager was screaming, "HELP ME!" to no one in particular.

"Nathan!" I shouted, dropping to my knees and trying to pull him out from under the manager with whom he was still wrestling.

"Are you with him?!" the manager demanded.

"Unfortunately yes," I grunted, but Nathan was not relenting that fucking walkie-talkie. "Nathan! Release! RELEASE!" My words proved futile as I was grabbed by a member of the bowling alley security team and dragged away from the scene straight from a _Carry On_ film in front of me. The manager extracted himself from the fray and as a second security guard tried to keep Nathan wrestled to the dirty floor, the curly-haired one began to choke and groan, his whole body beginning to convulse. Seriously. Was he actually serious right now? Faking an epileptic episode was a new low.

"Stop it! Stop it, stop it!" the manager ordered the security guard, making him release Nathan and stand up. They both stood back. "He's having a fit!"

"No," I said tonelessly. "He really is not."

"Quick, call an ambulance," Manager said to the guard, totally ignoring me.

That was when Nathan's eyes darted over to the two of them to check they were distracted, then to me, who was standing aside him with my arms crossed and a very disinterested expression. "Cheers for almost blowing me cover, Blake!" And with that, he leapt to his feet and darted off towards the bowling lanes, barrelling through a gumball machine on his way.

"NATHAN!" I yelled for the third time, fleeing after him just seconds after the manager and security guard had caught on and began to chase after him as well. Our game of cat-and-mouse took us into the physical lanes, everyone's games being put on hold as Nathan attempted to evade the two authority figures he was faced with...and me.

Whilst Manager and Guard were distracted, I managed to skirt past them to grab hold of Nathan's arm and hissed, "Stop being a dickhead! Whatever you did, just own up to it!"

"Get away from him, Miss!" Manager shouted at me.

"All I did was eat some pic n' mix!" Nathan protested, suddenly taking off down the aisles as the two men advanced on us. I tried to go after him…then I realised he'd hit the deck and was trying to crawl into the pinsetter. Yes, literally _into_ the pinsetter. The lack of brain cells this man had on even his best days never ceased to amaze me.

"Jesus Christ!" I griped to myself, beginning to become short of breath with the amount of running I'd now taken part in. I reached Nathan before the manager or the security guard, so I dropped down to my stomach and reached out, closing my hand around Nathan's ankle in an attempt to drag him back into reality.

It so did not work.

The second Nathan felt my hand, he must have panicked and assumed it was one of them other two dickheads because his flailing foot came flying up and caught me square in the collarbone. I fell backwards and hit my head on the polished wooden floor with a crack, letting out a pained yell of, "Nathan, you fucking moron!"

"Blake?!" his muffled shout came from within the pinsetter. "Fuck, I'm sorry, I- aarrghh!" I sat up as he cut off his apology with a scream and saw that both Manager and Guard had managed to extract him from the pinsetter and had him pinned down in the lane.

Manager's voice came from the speakers once again as he announced, "Stop bowling! _Stop bowling_!" He turned to me and, not into his walkie-talkie, firmly said, "Miss, if you could return to your lane please." I wasn't gonna argue at this point. With a mute nod, I turned and – carefully – made my way back to Scott and Alex, unable to turn to look at the other people in the building as the shame of being involved in that spectacle was almost too much to bear. Hell, I couldn't even look at Nathan getting dragged away by security.

"So you found him then?" Alex joked as I sat down.

I held my hand up at him. "Do not even go there with me right now, Alexander. Don't even fucking go there."

* * *

In the time that had passed since Nathan and I left the locker room, had discussed the previous evening, discovered Alisha and Curtis and now returned to the locker room, Kelly and Simon had both arrived and changed into their jumpsuits. Ohhhh shit, not Simon, anyone but Simon! _Okay, don't make eye contact, don't make eye contact…_

As Nathan launched into a frenzied account of what we'd nearly seen, I was more than aware of the fact that Simon was trying to catch my eye. I was desperately looking anywhere other than at him, even if it meant paying a stupidly over-the-top amount of attention to Nathan's recap, which naturally included gestures.

"I had nothing to do with this perverted act," I said once he'd finished his demonstration. "I was merely a bystander."

"Oh yeah, _I'm_ the perverted one," he shot back. "I'm not the one shaggin' during the workin' hours, was I?"

"You probably enjoyed it, you perv," Alisha retorted as she and Curtis wandered into the room, looking thoroughly embarrassed. Nathan just made a strange laughing noise. "What, do you want to have a look?" she added irately to Simon, who, it turned out, had been recording most of Nathan's little stage show.

He quickly slid his phone shut and said hastily, "N-no thanks. I'm okay."

Now that we'd finished the whole 'sending clothes to Africa' thing, we were back to the usual dull routine of – insert drumroll here – litter picking. Somehow I thought I'd prefer the clothing, the litter picking was steadily becoming so predictable that the monotony was about to turn my vision grey.

"Does anyone actually know what he got done for?" Alisha enquired with disdain as we made our way into the hallway, gesturing at Nathan.

"He reckons he was done for eatin' some pic n' mix," Kelly said.

"That's bullshit," Curtis scoffed, handing us three girls our pickers for the day. I had to snort at the apparent mystery surrounding Nathan's arrest. "Ah, c'mon Blake, you can't be doin' that shit and not telling us what happened."

"What? I just laughed," I said innocently. "I've said it before, that is not my story to tell and if he wants to rob you of that A-class comedy, that's on him." And with that, Kelly, Alisha and I headed towards the doors, not that Kelly and I missed the lingering misty-eyed glance Alisha and Curtis shared beforehand.

"Are you two, like, together?" Kelly asked.

"Yeah, I guess," she replied casually. "It's weird, yeah? 'Cause of my bullshit power thing, we don't actually have proper sex. We just...stare at each other and wank ourselves off. But it is really special."

"Now I'm even more glad Nathan couldn't open that door," I commented, dragging my litter picker on the floor beside me. "I'm happy for you, though. Go get that happy ending, girl."

"Cheers, Blake." Alisha gave me a genuine smile. Wow, community service really was changing me. I'd just had a girly conversation that _hadn't_ resulted in me vomiting on the floor from the clichéd nausea.

"I think it sounds a bit gross," Kelly said bluntly.

"What? Why?" Alisha demanded.

"Couldn't yas just...not have sex for a bit?" she suggested as we emerged into the sunshine.

"I am not livin' my life without shaggin'!" Alisha replied insistently. "This is all we _can_ do. Like, all you wanna do is get down to it, and you can't, so you've gotta find a way, y'know?"

"That's disgustin'."

"It's not fuckin' disgustin'!"

"Oookay, this is so not my bitchfest to get involved with," I informed them, moving away to the side, intending to chill with Nathan, but he was still unrelentingly teasing Simon by snapping his litter-picker by Simon's crotch and exclaiming, "It's not gay if I wank ya off with the grabber! We're not touchin'!"

I saw Simon's face, how uncomfortable he looked. That guilt that had been manifesting since last night boiled up and up...and I snapped. "For God's sake, just leave him alone!" I said angrily.

"Ooh, what you gettin' all defensive for?" Nathan said in a real 'wink-wink, nudge-nudge' tone. He thought I was joking.

"I'm getting defensive because I'm fed up of you treating him like dirt! He's done absolutely nothing to you, Nathan, so just back the fuck off!"

Everyone went totally silent. Even Curtis tore himself away from some dark-haired girl he'd been talking to by the door to see what was going on. Everyone crowded us to watch the BFF SmackDown developing in front of them.

Nathan raised his eyebrows at me. "Come on, Blakey, I'm only playin'!" A grin spread across his face and he mock-gasped, "Do you love him?"

"No, I don't love him!" I yelled, far more harshly than I intended. Now Simon looked even more uncomfortable, but now it was tinged with sadness. Oh good, just keep kicking that puppy, B. I quietened my voice, "You need to back off, Nathan, seriously," I repeated. "You're my best mate and I couldn't normally give a fuck what you do. But now all you ever do is humiliate and degrade him, and it isn't right! He doesn't deserve to be treated like that!"

"You looovee hiiim!" Nathan sang.

"Oh, fuck off," I spat, turning on my heel and stalking away. I was not dealing with this right now.

* * *

This was getting ridiculous. Nathan had been in that fucking managers office for well over half an hour. I'd told Scott and Alex to go home since they had no need to hang around. I, on the other hand, was Nathan's lift so I couldn't exactly leave him stranded here. Fucking hell, what if that bloody manager was calling the police? He looked like the kinda square who would.

I'd kept my head bowed the entire time I'd been sitting here, still in the seats to our lane, not that we'd been able to get around to finishing the bloody game. People were whispering still, or maybe that was just my anxiety messing with my head. I didn't know. Sometimes it was hard to tell the difference between reality and my fucked up brain.

I tapped my nails against my knee, waiting for that idiot to pop up in front of me, tell me everything was okay and we could go home. Wishful thinking, I knew. I was just so damn tired. Lights out in the unit had been 9:30 every night and I'd grown a custom to early nights. Now it was past midnight, and I was ready to pass out from exhaustion at this point.

My phone started to ring in my pocket, the opening guitar chords of _In Bloom_ by Nirvana suddenly blaring around the lanes. Shock horror, the name displayed when I pulled it out was Nathan's. Having a feeling I knew what this could be about, I accepted the call. "I am not paying anything for the damages _you_ caused, Nathan."

"Aw, come on, Blakey, I just need-"

"No." My patience was gone. I ended the call and chucked the mobile into my bag. I was just zipping it up when I looked up and saw...Him. He was the lane over, staring right at me.

My heart stopped. Every nerve ending on my body seemed to tingle. My breathing hitched in my throat and my palms began to sweat. The world fell silent aside from the roaring of the blood in my ears.

I blinked hard, sure I was imagining things. No. When I opened my eyes he was still there. He had a Cheshire cat grin, and he was walking towards me.

I tried backing up, moving as quickly as I could but my uncoordinated arse ensured I wouldn't have a smooth getaway. Instead, my heel caught against the leg of one of the plastic chairs and I stumbled, slowing to a halt as I attempted to balance myself. That was when I looked up and found myself face-to-face with Him for the first time in over three months. Julian fucking Quinn.

"Hey there, Princess," he said smugly. "Long time, no see."

My mouth instantly went dry. I swallowed a couple of times but nothing happened. "There's a reason for that." My voice was nothing but a powdery whisper.

"It's not what I would have wanted, but you know that," he said, reaching out to touch my face like he always would, but this time I flinched back, the memory of the last time his hand had connected with my skin still too fresh. "Oh Blake, I'd so hoped we could still be friends."

"I don't...I don't want to be friends," I mumbled, so intimidated that I couldn't even meet his eye. "Please Julian, just leave me alone."

"Don't be like that, baby," Julian pretended to sigh like he was disappointed. "You're still the love of my life, you know that."

"The love of your life?" I repeated, finally bringing myself to look at him. "_I'm_ the love of your life? Are you fucking kidding me?! How fucking dare you!" My voice began to rise with every word; my blood was boiling. "If I'm the love of your life then I dread to think how you treat your enemies!"

"Blake, keep your voice down." And just like that, the Mr Nice Guy charade was gone, replaced with the controlling, threatening Julian I truly knew.

"Why? What can you do here, Jules? You wanna hit me in front of all these witnesses?" There were about seven other people here, but my point remained. "Touch me again and I swear to God, I'll put you away properly this time."

"Really?" Julian laughed bitterly. "That spastic best mate of yours couldn't get me done after I finally shut you up and gave him a black eye, what do you think could happen now? I'm untouchable, bumblebee, you've just gotta live with that."

"You fucking psychopath," I spat at him. I seized hold of my backpack and pulled it onto my shoulders, ready to just walk away. "Just stay away from me, alright? Get it into your head that I want nothing to do with you." I turned to leave, but Julian's hand closed around my wrist – my left wrist.

"What's this, B?" he tutted, examining the thick red line. "Guess the rumours were true. I heard you got locked up in the mental ward, I just didn't think you were that stupid."

I snatched my arm back, my eyes beginning to flood with tears. "You've got no idea what I've been through after what you did to me, Julian. No fucking idea."

"I know exactly what you've been through," he taunted. "You didn't get enough attention from your pathetic jaw wire or when the trial didn't go your way, so you had to do something else to make sure the attention was still on you. Ooh, everyone, look at Blake, look at Blake!"

"You son of a bitch!" I snarled. "This was nothing to do with attention, it was _everything_ to do with feeling so broken and worthless because of _you_ that I felt like I had no other choice!"

"Oh yeah? Well maybe it would have been a lot easier on everyone if you'd done it properly," he said spitefully. "No one's gonna go for your damaged goods ever again." He began to laugh.

"MOTHERFUCKER!" I screamed, a red mist descending. Everyone in the vicinity turned to gawp at us. Two dramatic scenes in one night, these patrons certainly got more than they bargained for. I didn't care. Like a woman possessed, I grabbed hold of one of the big, 14-weight bowling balls sitting in the ball return and held it up.

Julian's laughing immediately stopped. "Blake? Blake, what are you doing?"

"Learn to shut the fuck up for once!" I screeched, and I released the bowling ball, straight onto his foot.

"ARGH! ARGH, YOU FUCKING BITCH, WHAT THE FUCK!" he howled, wrenching his foot out from the ball and falling backwards, curling up in foetal position on the floor with his hands cradling that foot. "MY TOES! YOU'VE BROKEN MY FUCKING TOES!"

"Yeah? Well you broke my heart and my fucking face," I spat.

"Oh my God, did you see that?!" a male voice to my left gasped, and I turned to see a bloke staring at me, a woman at his face looking completely aghast. "She just attacked him!"

"I'm getting security!" the woman declared, running off to the reception desk.

I collapsed backwards into one of the chairs, my hands covering my face. What had I just done? I wasn't the star of the local sports team, there was no way I was gonna get away with this. I didn't have the fight left in me even if I'd wanted to. So whilst the resident first aider arrived to deal with the whimpering Julian, I allowed myself to be frogmarched towards the main office – the same office Nathan was still being held in – with the promise that the police would most certainly be being called.

"Make it quick then," I muttered. "I just wanna go to bed."

"Don't worry, I think they'll be here soon enough," I was told as the office door opened and...Nathan's _dad_ walked out?! What the fuck was he doing here?! How had I missed that one?!

"Blake?" he said quizzically as I was shoved past him.

"Evening, Mike," I said wearily. I couldn't wait to hear this story from Nathan at the next available opportunity.

"Oh shut up, Beverley," was the first thing I heard as I was shoved into the office, followed by witnessing Nathan reach over the desk with a stapler and stapling the manager's hand straight in the middle of the bone. I was so exhausted by this point that I couldn't even react. How had tonight managed to go so spectacularly wrong? All I'd wanted was a bag of bloody pic n' mix.

* * *

I ended up back in the community centre, sitting in that storage locker with the screen down. A few minutes later, I heard Kelly calling me.

"Blake! Blake, are ya in here?" I didn't bother to reply. "I know ya are, I can hear ya thinkin'!"

_Then come find me,_ I thought.

A second later, Kelly lifted up the metal screen and stared at me. I gave her a look that blatantly read _Don't want to talk about it,_ but it didn't make any difference and she came and set next to me, drawing her knees up to her chin.

"So what was that all about?" Never one to beat around the bush, was our Kelly.

"I went out with Simon for that drink last night," I mumbled. "He...he asked me out on a date at the end of it. I panicked, and I just – I just slammed the door in his face. I just left him there, Kelly. He's so used to getting rejected and I tried so hard to not be that person but I was. I'm not better than anyone else who taunts him."

"Is that why you spazzed out at Nathan?"

I nodded. "The guilt's been killing me all day. I guess seeing Nathan treat Simon like I think I did was enough to make me snap a bit."

"A bit? He nearly shat himself," Kelly snorted. "But he's worried about ya. He thinks ya crackin' up."

"Maybe I am," I said sadly, dragging a hand through my hair. "My head's fucked, man. I'm done in enough as it is, add in the murders and...other things, I feel like I'm losing it."

"'Other things' like the fact ya think ya fancy Nathan?" she said bluntly.

"Oh good, you know about that," I said mordantly.

"It ain't exactly hard to work it out," she responded. "Even without hearin' ya thoughts."

"What do you mean?"

"Before ya started gettin' all friendly with Simon, you and Nathan were just like, fuckin' glued to each other. And I know ya best mates and all that, but there's somethin' else there, everyone can see it. Everyone but you two dick'eads, but no one else has the balls to tell ya like I do. Ya just lucky that Nathan's so fuckin' blind when it comes to this kinda stuff that he hasn't noticed yet."

I shrugged. "That's probably a good thing. I don't wanna fuck up mine and his friendship like I have done with Simon"

Kelly looked at me almost wisely, before standing up. "Nah, I reckon ya should talk to Simon about what happened."

I shook my head. "I can't. It'll be way too awkward. Besides, I can guarantee he probably hates me now," I said, standing up as well.

"Trust me, he doesn't hate ya," Kelly assured me. "He just wants to talk to ya, I know he does."

"How?"

Kelly grinned and tapped her temple with one of her long, red acrylic nails. "Cause I heard him think it."

* * *

**A/N – Okay, I didn't intend for this chapter to end up so long, but I was trying to cram pretty much an entire episode into one chapter and I really wanted to do it justice. A little bit more Blake/Kelly bonding at the end there, I really want them to have a solid friendship through all this. I hope you enjoyed, would love to see a few more reviews as they've dried up a little bit over the last couple of chapters. Stay safe, and love to you all. Xx Gee xX**

**Chapter Ten Playlist  
**_**Never Bloom Again –**_** Waterparks  
**_**Scars**_** – Papa Roach  
**_**Broken Arrow –**_**Pixie Lott**


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